Harvesting from the park

These past few weeks have seen me and the kids at our local country park, just a few streets away from our house, foraging for some wild food.  There are quite a lot of wild edibles there that we know of:  mint, bullaces (a small wild plum), oregano, raspberries, hazelnuts, pears, and even an invasive species of crayfish.  However, we have been picking:

Blackberries

It's been a good year for wild blackberries.  Often they turn out small, sour and seedy;  but this year I've picked a lot of big, sweet juicy ones.  Still seedy of course!  But more juice per seed.  In the past I've made jam, put them in smoothies and used the puree in ice cream.  I've also combined them with wild elderberries to make wine, which is my plan for this year too.

Apples

It seems it's not been a great year for apples however.  My own trees have been producing biennially, and this was the off year:  no apples.  There are quite a lot of wild trees at the country park, and most are nice enough to eat though nothing spectacular (we only know one phenomenally bitter tree).  Unfortunately, the trees there haven't produced much either, and most of it quite small.  The son and I went picking at the weekend and came back with a sack of which the largest were golf ball sized.  These will be for eating only--at least they are free and the kids don't mind the size.  I know of another couple of trees we didn't visit so we'll have to check them next.  

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Our country park used to be a coal mine, and our village a mining village.  When I moved here almost 20 years ago, the park was mostly just a flat grassy field with a small memorial to the miners and a largeish fishing pond at the far end, with a young weedy forest around that.  The whole park has since been planted with many trees;  other plants have recolonised to make it a real haven for wildlife and local people alike.

I have in the past harvested quite a lot of different things at our park, including herbs for simple remedies such as plantain and alder to make a soothing skin cream.  I've even gathered reeds for basketry and old dead wood to use as kindling in our wood stove:  it's a bountiful resource practically at our doorstep.