Anyone Still Gather Wild Fruit?

[muckdiva]

I love picking blackberries, sloes, elderflowers, cobnuts, bullaces and, when they are available, field mushrooms. We do sometimes get a glut of the latter in the horse paddocks. Puffballs are great, so long as they are really fresh - only problem is they don't keep so you need to invite friends round to help you eat them (no hardship!)

My sister's ex is Romanian, and he was very good at collecting wild food, and preserving it too. Skills handed down from his mother...

[A Life Less Simple]

I still do as well, mustrooms and blackberries mostly.
I was just trying to think of something to do with the damsons that are still in the freezer from last year this morning

[Naturesbane]

I haven't been out gathering wild and the not so wild fruit in a very long time, I can still recall the shouts of "Oi I know yer father!!!"

I need to discover where the good picking places are near to where I live now.

[smallblueplanet]

I haven't been out gathering wild and the not so wild fruit in a very long time, I can still recall the shouts of "Oi I know yer father!!!"

ROFL!!!

[divvy]

I collect Elderflowers, Elderberries and blackberries. Your right about it dying out though. Last year when we were blackberrying some young boys asked what we were doing and when I told them they said " can you eat them then ?"

[Cloud]

Yeah I still do it with my children.Blackberries but also Damsons,Greengages, Sweet Chestnuts,Wild Garlic and Cobnuts!

[Alison]

Brambles and mushrooms mainly but OH is keen to do a bit more so we could be out on a few foraging walks soon!

[lynda66]

i only get elderberries, as theres about 20 trees in the waste ground at the back of my house, i've been thinking about getting a load of blackberries and chucking them in there too, so i don't have to have them in my garden, they are building an industrial estate at the bottom of the hill though, so until we know what they are doing with this spare 20 foot of so, it's not worth it, though i am hoping they will just leave it, to run wild so i can extend my garden and plant wild stuff in it(ok a bit of a cheat lol) previously it was filled with 40 years of dumped crap as no one could see it, but the nice people have cleared it all out

[Lavenderblue]

oh we get sloes and blackberries mostly. We make sloe gin from the sloes and eat the blackberries. We sometimes get elderberries and elderflowers to make wine and jam with. I love picking wild berries, its great fun and I sort of feel a connection with the ages. I wonder how many generations have stood in the hedgerow picking nature's bounty.

[burnie]

Mostly pick for wine making,rose hips elders etc and blackberries as they are my favourite fruit,don't taste the same out of the garden somehow.Now in Scotland I 'm planning a forage in the hills any time now.

[Paulottie]

I've got half an allotment of fruit these days, but I still collect elder flowers/berries, blackberries etc. normally mixed in with crab apples a few loganberries and any luck finds to make a few pots of hedgerow jelly...Mmmm.

My father definately started me on sloe hunting, Although I now have a house in Brittany with a garden full of blackthorn. He also showed me the secret of making the best sloe gin and all manner of mushroom hunting. My children often come mushrooming with me. The trouble with them fruit picking is not much goes in the basket! Isn't there something primeval and natural about teaching your children how to forage and hunt...Shows just out of touch we have become with our environment.

I think a lot of wildfood is overlooked in many areas of Britain but the selfish side of that is; those of us who do know can have rich pickings!

[Waffler]

I love blackberry picking. In fact I love getting anything free from the wild, but sadly am not very skilled at knowing what's what. So I collect blackberries, elderflowers, elderberries, hazelnuts, wild garlic, nettles and I think that's it. I have plans to pick damsons or sloes (see - don't know what's what!) this year. We're lucky, we have apples, pears and plums in the garden already.
Hubby wants to go american crayfish hunting! Not quite 'hedgerow' but food for free nonetheless. Apparently you need a license though, so of course the plan hasn't yet been put into action!

[burnie]

Anyone a bit unsure about what you can eat might try looking for Richard Mabey's book Food for Free. I've had a copy since it first came out - when he was young and dark-haired - and I was young and slim!

Just bought a 2004 copy from e-*ay for a fiver , can't wait for it to arrive,I've always suspected I was missing a free feed,thanks for the pointer.

[lettucegrow!]

Picked Sloes and Blackberries this weekend. Going to get the gin this evening but need more berries for making jelly so have to go back. I noticed loads of Hawthorn where I went and someone mentioned them.What do you make with them?

[crazii_c]

i use to go blackberry picking with my grandma when i was little. however this is the first year that ive done it since. ive picked blackberries, elderberries and ive got my eye on some sloes ready for the gin!