Tag: berries

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Quince Love

When we moved to our cold, wet island, 57 degrees north of everything, we maybe had a lingering doubt about the things that we’d miss. Lots of positives and upsides, of course, but there would be some things we’d have to compromise on, we knew.

The biggest worry of these was fruit. We love our fruit, and the thought of going without fresh fruit for any period of time was a bit of a concern. Surely living on the chilly, northernmost and westernmost rim of Europe would mean that figs, quince, loquats and ripe peaches would become things of fond memory?

Today I picked up a crate of fragrant Spanish quinces from the local store, who had ordered them in especially for us. From our local community store. How amazing is that.

Fresh quinces

That will sort us from a quince perspective for a while. Husband will eat them, hard and raw (he is bizarre) whereas I will poach them in a sugar syrup with cinnamon sticks and juniper berries, then roast them in frangipane tarts and sweet pastries.

Quince frangipan tart

The rest of the fruit we source from local organic crofts, or the local Co-op supermarket.

We try to keep it local but apart from apples, pears, rhubarb, local quince and berry fruit I haven’t managed to find local croft sources for anything else, and certainly not the exotics as an occasional treat. Supermarket fruit is often under ripe and tasteless, let alone the concerns that I have about the food miles involved, so anything that we can do to reduce our reliance on them as a source of produce is a good thing in our opinion.

This is where the polytunnel will come in. We plan to grow nectarines, peaches, quinces and maybe loquats in the tunnel. If we can. Unlikely as it seems, the shelter that the tunnel will provide along with the long summer days this far north will be enough, with a bit of skill and patience, to produce these things. We’ve seen peaches grown in polycrubs in Shetland, which is even further north and even more exposed than us, so I have every hope!

These combined with the berry beds as well as the apple and pear orchard that we have planned, and we should be covered for most of our future fruit needs.

Polycrub with space for trees

Bananas sadly remain a step too far for these northern shores.

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Sunday musings

As I sit here with my feet up in front of the fire and a blanket across my legs, the rain is lashing the sides of the caravan. There is a small, furry dog snoring by my side, I feel content that it’s been a productive week.

The weather broke yesterday from a four day dry spell. It held long enough for us to finish the guttering at the back of the house after a great deal of effort and frozen fingers.

Do not ask me what husband is doing at this point on the flat roof….. I couldn’t resist a quick shot. 😊 (Cyprus Joe, that’s a metaphorical shot before you start with the death of husband jokes.. 😉)

It may have been dry but it was only about three or four degrees centigrade at most, and especially cold whilst up the ladder.

Husband says that he’s developed a death grip from hanging on grimly whilst working at height ..

There’s been some progress too on the croft side. The seeds are coming along nicely. The potatoes are chitting. I’ve pricked out lettuce, beetroot and parsley seeds, which seem to be growing well despite the rather makeshift greenhouse arrangements in the caravan.

I’ve also planted out the garlic into the raised beds and have the hoops and enviromesh ready for when anything else goes in. Which the locals advise shouldn’t be until the end of April at the earliest to avoid the threat of frost…

I’ve sowed some borage, calendula and nasturtiums as companion plants: we may as well start to provide food for beneficial insects and bees as quickly as we can. I’ve now run out of room completely for seed trays…this last batch are balanced precariously on the cooker…

On the compost side, husband has ordered the material for the compost bin roof and we’ve started adding our household vegetable waste to the bins.

A neighbour is happy to keep her composting food waste for us too, so this should double the rate of build up. I’ve also sourced donkey, horse and chicken poo locally from crofters and stables, so as soon as we can collect we can add these to the mix.

And the berry bed that I have been planning for so long is starting!

I now have honeyberry, tayberry, raspberry and blueberry plants all ready for planting. I also have cuttings of jostaberry, red gooseberry, and blackcurrant which have survived the worst of the winter so far and which have started to bud..

A good week.

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Seedily Yours

I may be getting ahead of myself a bit here, as we don’t have any vegetable beds dug yet, but I couldn’t resist buying a few seeds to start things off next spring.

I had to do it. I was starting to get worried about reports that the pandemic was causing seed companies to run out, and that there wouldn’t be any left if I ordered too late. So over a cup of tea and a few rainy afternoons I pulled together a seed order, and they arrived last week.

It’s such a lovely feeling when the post arrives and you open the parcel. The fat little paper seed packets fall out, sparklingly full of promise!

Many of these things need a few years to establish before they can be cropped, so it made sense to start next year even if we are busy with the house build.

I just need to find a few days in the Spring to get my husband to help build windbreaks, plant protective hedging, make a couple of raised beds and get the soil prepared. I’ve worked out the most sheltered spot for the raised beds and a planting plan.

Most of these seeds aren’t sown directly into the soil until April/May or even later, so there is time.

I’m also looking at cold frames for a bit of protection for some of the young plants, although wherever possible I will plant into the beds directly. I don’t have a greenhouse or polytunnel yet and there will be no room in the caravan for lots of trays of seedlings.

I’m going to try to grow beetroot, onions, carrots, kale, salad leaves, cabbage, potatoes, rainbow chard, and winter squash (I know this one might be a challenge, but it’s worth a try). I also want to have a berry bed, and grow rhubarb, so am looking for varieties and crowns that will work well in our extreme climate.

I’m going to start with just a few berry bushes and vegetables and increase the variety next year once the house is finished and we can start to spend more time on the croft itself. It’s going to be a busy year of experimentation, working out what grows well here.

Once we start growing things I think the process of rooting ourselves to this land will finally have begun properly.