Sloe Berries

[doglad]

Our local blackthorn bushes do not have any berries on.
Have I missed them or are they due on the next few weeks?
I am after making some sloe gin as was told to pick the berries after the first frost, but as yet there are no berries!

[coasty]

Originally Posted by doglad

Our local blackthorn bushes do not have any berries on.
Have I missed them or are they due on the next few weeks?
I am after making some sloe gin as was told to pick the berries after the first frost, but as yet there are no berries!

If the berries arent there now there wont be any.....

[aeshna5]

Plenty of ripe sloes about now, so if you can't see any, there won't be any this year.

[Hedge Witch]

Welcome to WAB, doglad. We have plenty of sloes around us, but they seem to be rare in (parts of) Sussex:

Crop status for foragers in Sussex.

So success of the crop this year depends on where you live, I think

[shirl]

We have sloes out at the moment and ripe - just waiting to be transformed into sloe gin. Sorry you may have missed out where you are, wild resources seem to fayre the same as cultivated. Good years and bad years I am afraid.

Shirl

[doglad]

Originally Posted by shirl

We have sloes out at the moment and ripe - just waiting to be transformed into sloe gin. Sorry you may have missed out where you are, wild resources seem to fayre the same as cultivated. Good years and bad years I am afraid.

Shirl

Yeah, there were loads on the same bushes last year, this year I have found 1 bush out of about 20 with only a few on PS it is in the Chester-le-Street area of Co. Durham.

[Hobjob]

Sloes are among the first trees / bushes to flower so are proine to be
clobbered by late frosts; I guess that is even more likely up your way in
Co Durham I imagine.

Still too early to pick according to folklore and my Granny - should be
picked after the first frost, but that is getting kind of difficult these
days

I freeze mine - not to improve them, but rather to split them, reducing
the need to prick them. The ones Ipicked in an Essex country park last#year looked as if they were a planted tree and soft as anything.