Living off the fat of the land...

raspberry.jpg
Originally uploaded by mcmrbt.

When I were a wee nipper, come September, the whole family would head off into the countryside in my dad's Morris Traveller to pick blackberries.* Empty 4 litre ice cream tubs were filled, and there was much subsequent jam, pies, and crumble action. We'd take blankets, thick clothes, etc., and meet other people out doing the same thing. You'd throw a blanket over the base of the brambles, and then sort of throw yourself against it in order to reach the higher fruit (the low hanging fruit is picked quickly, hence the expression).

How strange it is now to realise that almost nobody bothers to pick blackberries these days (or anything else, come to that). Is it because they think that our environment is so badly damaged that such things no longer exist in our hedgerows and country lanes?

It's just over a year since we first viewed the house we now live in. The day we turned up, I noticed that the border between it and the school next door was filled with brambles. Now I've lived there a while, I know that there are brambles almost all the way round the school, and around the park behind it. And for a couple of weeks now, we've been picking the berries as they become ripe.

Friday night, I set to with secateurs and started trimming some of the higher vines and picking the berries at a more comfortable angle. We filled a couple of containers in a short interval, combined with some pruning of the brambles, because they are among the most evil plants known to man, capable of sending out shoots that grow around a metre a week and then burrow into the ground where they hit.

You see blackberries in the supermarket, cultivated ones, in sanitised plastic packaging, for around £2 for 200g. On that basis, I've picked at least £20 worth over the past couple of weeks. I've made 3 crumbles, a cheesecake, and given a load to my sister. My kids tend not to like them cooked, but love to eat them off the vine. What could be better than that?

I see people with apple trees in their gardens, who just let the fruit ripen and fall to the ground to rot. In other words, it's not even a question of not wanting to drive out into some country lane. It's just one of the traditions of this country that has been allowed to wither and die on the vine. In the end, people are, what? Too rich? Too rich and self-important to pick berries? It's a family activity that doesn't take a hell of a lot of time, but my kids love it, they do, and it's something we've done together and we've been close and had fun.

Maybe people are just happier to see their kids hanging around the fish and chip shop all day long instead?

*The picture of the raspberry was taken in my in-law's garden