hedgerowpete
Regular.
- Joined
- Dec 15, 2019
- Messages
- 327
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As I write this in deepest January. I thought I would mention ways to improve on your Elderberry crop this year.
Now before I get on my high horse I must mention I am not a flower picker, I am a berry man. In fact anyone caught distroying the berry fruit harvest i belive should be thrown in the local canal!!! Hotley followed by Hugh Fernley Whittingstall for starting all this flower nonsense in the first place.
For many people the Elder bush is total ignored all year except for a few weeks each year when the berries are in fruit. Then armed with buckets off they go to grab as many as posible with out thinking of the effort put in.
My name is "Hedgerow Pete" for a reason. i harvest hedgerows, i also plant specific trees and bushes to suit my food needs. mint instead of nettles, basal lemon grass and so forth, we also plant trees and nuts too.
If you did not know aan elderberry crops on fresh green groth,not old wood. by pruning and trimming we can get the bush to produce new shoots and therefore new growth points and there on new berrys!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
What we need to do in the winter time is to pop along to the elderberry bushs you know of and help them , help your self, anything old, broken or diseased. grotty or congested, saw it out or cut it out, it means more effort goes into the main bush or tree system. next up is the tips of all the branch ends, you want three tips to each end, any more and cut the thinest ones out, some times we do a big prune and here we will snip the first foot back on every limb, some times the bush is congested with ivy and weeds and broken and damaged stems and here in a few rare cases we will pollard it back to a metre tall, hack all the ivy out as ALL IVY MUST GO and generally clean the elder out of rubbish and rot.
no elder in your area?
make some!
cutters the size of a pencil snipped and stabbed into the ground will grow, or take all those seeds and berry pulp and drop it in fixed places along the hedgerows too reseed it.
The only thing i suggest you dont do is cut down the bush completley and remove it or kill it off, according to Warwickshire, Witchcraft legends theres supposed to be a witch underneath, held captive by the roots, so dont let her out.
Now before I get on my high horse I must mention I am not a flower picker, I am a berry man. In fact anyone caught distroying the berry fruit harvest i belive should be thrown in the local canal!!! Hotley followed by Hugh Fernley Whittingstall for starting all this flower nonsense in the first place.
For many people the Elder bush is total ignored all year except for a few weeks each year when the berries are in fruit. Then armed with buckets off they go to grab as many as posible with out thinking of the effort put in.
My name is "Hedgerow Pete" for a reason. i harvest hedgerows, i also plant specific trees and bushes to suit my food needs. mint instead of nettles, basal lemon grass and so forth, we also plant trees and nuts too.
If you did not know aan elderberry crops on fresh green groth,not old wood. by pruning and trimming we can get the bush to produce new shoots and therefore new growth points and there on new berrys!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
What we need to do in the winter time is to pop along to the elderberry bushs you know of and help them , help your self, anything old, broken or diseased. grotty or congested, saw it out or cut it out, it means more effort goes into the main bush or tree system. next up is the tips of all the branch ends, you want three tips to each end, any more and cut the thinest ones out, some times we do a big prune and here we will snip the first foot back on every limb, some times the bush is congested with ivy and weeds and broken and damaged stems and here in a few rare cases we will pollard it back to a metre tall, hack all the ivy out as ALL IVY MUST GO and generally clean the elder out of rubbish and rot.
no elder in your area?
make some!
cutters the size of a pencil snipped and stabbed into the ground will grow, or take all those seeds and berry pulp and drop it in fixed places along the hedgerows too reseed it.
The only thing i suggest you dont do is cut down the bush completley and remove it or kill it off, according to Warwickshire, Witchcraft legends theres supposed to be a witch underneath, held captive by the roots, so dont let her out.
