As the days grow noticeably shorter and the leaves being to turn, bursts of colour adorn the trees, shrubs and hedgerows, and help to feed hungry critters, birds, insects … and, occasionally, me, if the blackberries look lush and bursting with flavour.
It’s grey today, with heavy rain, so I felt the need for a splash of colour to brighten the day. The vivid pinks of Spindle, the deep reds of Yew, wild rose hips, and Holly certainly buoyed my spirits – I hope you also find them cheering, whatever your weather.
This was @wildflower_hour’s tweet announcing this week’s #WildflowerHour challenge:
Samaras, siliques, nuts, drupes, berries, hips and capsules, how many different types of wild fruit can you find? That’s the challenge this week for #WildflowerHour. Share your pics this Sunday 8-9pm using the hashtag #fruits.
I’m saving my samaras, siliques, nuts and capsules for another day but here are my drupes, berries and hips: an assortment of Black bryony, Bramble, Buckthorn, Crab apple, Dewberry, Red-osier dogwood (with vivid red stems and white fruit) and Common dogwood, Guelder rose, Hawthorn, the hips of Japanese rose (these grow wild at the local country park) and Dog-rose, Sloe, Whitebeam, Woody nightshade and Yew.
I’ve been resisting taking berry photos, trying to deny the fact that the days are shortening and the summer heat slowly fading, but I have been watching the Wayfaring trees I featured earlier this year, in the post The Wayfarer, and I couldn’t resist documenting how the glorious flowers from May have gradually been developing into luscious shiny red berries.
Wales is once again living up to its reputation for being a wet country, a fact about which I may not be particularly happy but the slugs are once again / still loving it.
‘On the motionless branches of some trees, autumn berries hung like
clusters of coral beads, as in those fabled orchards where the fruit were jewels …’
~ Charles Dickens, The Life and Adventures of Martin Chuzzlewit
Draping and dangling, twisting and tangling, Black bryony’s luscious red berries can be found hanging from fences, winding in hedges, looping over bushes, climbing up trees. One of Autumn’s finest treasures.
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