Foraging
Today, I have:
- picked 2.2kg of sloes, mostly from our field but a few from the bush at the end of the road, currently in the freezer (because, really, why would you faff about pricking each one with a pin when you can just do that instead?) awaiting combination with four bottles of gin to give six bottles of sloe gin;
- picked just over a kilo of blackberries, mostly from the woods (have also noted the bushes with lots of nearly-ripe ones!), which are in the freezer in four different bags;
- set two bowls of peaches (picked up by Mike in town for £1.50, and really needing to be sold that cheaply) to juicing;
- harvested most of the hop flowers, taken off the leaves, made a few stems into a little wreath and put the lot on the airer to dry;
- checked that our existing hop plant, which we found in the bee garden this year, didn't have any flowers: must be a male;
- planted the Canterbury Bells that the woman from the top of the hill left by the gate for me (she'd promised me some as they started to die back; as I came back from blackberrying, she said "I hope that the ducks won't have eaten them" but I was able to reassure her that they're not all that into plants); and
- got generally scratched, stung and pricked all over my arms and hands: short sleeves not the best idea when picking sloes....
I made the first batch of juice from out apples a few days ago: it's a wee bit sour for me, and the apples took forever to cook down so it's also a bit watery, but later ones should be better. The apples are noticably bigger than last year, from having been thinned out a few months ago. We did go up to the Minnis a few days ago, but the wilder apples there weren't ready for picking.
Oh, and ridden, mucked out and poo picked. We had a bedding delivery today: the pallet is currently by the gate, and Mike's just said "How about if we go and move the bedding into the tack room now?"
This entry was originally posted at http://flick.dreamwidth.org/979598.html, where it has
comment(s). Add comments here or there, if you feel like it.
- picked 2.2kg of sloes, mostly from our field but a few from the bush at the end of the road, currently in the freezer (because, really, why would you faff about pricking each one with a pin when you can just do that instead?) awaiting combination with four bottles of gin to give six bottles of sloe gin;
- picked just over a kilo of blackberries, mostly from the woods (have also noted the bushes with lots of nearly-ripe ones!), which are in the freezer in four different bags;
- set two bowls of peaches (picked up by Mike in town for £1.50, and really needing to be sold that cheaply) to juicing;
- harvested most of the hop flowers, taken off the leaves, made a few stems into a little wreath and put the lot on the airer to dry;
- checked that our existing hop plant, which we found in the bee garden this year, didn't have any flowers: must be a male;
- planted the Canterbury Bells that the woman from the top of the hill left by the gate for me (she'd promised me some as they started to die back; as I came back from blackberrying, she said "I hope that the ducks won't have eaten them" but I was able to reassure her that they're not all that into plants); and
- got generally scratched, stung and pricked all over my arms and hands: short sleeves not the best idea when picking sloes....
I made the first batch of juice from out apples a few days ago: it's a wee bit sour for me, and the apples took forever to cook down so it's also a bit watery, but later ones should be better. The apples are noticably bigger than last year, from having been thinned out a few months ago. We did go up to the Minnis a few days ago, but the wilder apples there weren't ready for picking.
Oh, and ridden, mucked out and poo picked. We had a bedding delivery today: the pallet is currently by the gate, and Mike's just said "How about if we go and move the bedding into the tack room now?"
This entry was originally posted at http://flick.dreamwidth.org/979598.html, where it has
comment(s). Add comments here or there, if you feel like it.