Sunday 16 August 2009

Season Of Mellow Fruitfulness?.........

.... OK, so perhaps it's a bit early for all that. But the blackberry that has been trespassing over the wall from next door's garden is clearly keen to get on with it.

I have been assiduously hacking it back for two years, on the assumption that it was a common (or garden) bramble. Not until I looked up from the sun lounger today, mid-chapter, and spotted a clutch of huge berries half way up a large bush, where I had missed it, did I realise that it's probably some kind of cultivar. The berries are much larger than I recall from the hedgerows of yesteryear, and exceptionally sweet.

Rather wish I had not been so eager with the secateurs now.

5 comments:

said...

Yummmmmmmmmmmmy

Petunia's Gardener said...

I'm sure it was your special pruning touch that produced the harvest! Aren't surprises extra sweet?

The Allotment Blogger said...

Wow, they look fantastic - and it's true that if you've been pruning it back, it may have become stressed enough to produce fruit again, after years of not doing much - so you've done everybody a favour!

Julian said...

If you can post a good picture of one (ideally with a scale and a picture of leaves and the thorns (or lack of them) I can probably tell you which cultivar it is (although we are better known for hedging, we grow a fair number of blackberry varieties commercially)

Love the blog by the way and you have some outstanding photos - what do you use?

Best
Julian

Greenmantle said...

Julian ... Sorry for the delay in replying.

I'm afraid I took the pictures a couple of months ago, so the fruit and most of the leaves have all gone now. But thanks anyway.

And thanks for the photographic compliment. I use a Nikon D200 mostly, with Nikon and Sigma lenses. The occasional shot is from a Leica D-Lux3 compact, as it's much easier to carry around.