Foraging forumagers

Walnut’s de-hulled and ready to dry. I recommend rubber gloves.

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Are these damsons? Spotted them on my walk to work.

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• 20220924_132117.heic

Afternoon walk with family and picked up some chestnuts for Christmas.

Also got a load of fungi (for fun) which I think are false chanterelle, bay bolette, pine bolette, sulphur tufts, ink caps.

Also saw dog sick fungus.
(Edit: dog vomis slime)

Happy to be corrected on any of these. Tempted by the bolettes but the rest won't be eaten.

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Ink caps are very tasty before they become inky.

There was only one unfortunately as the rest has decomposed. Maybe I'll add it to the bolettes which I had planned to make a tasty lunch on toast tomorrow .

Probably something damson-y, bullace or whatever. I’ve no idea how to tell the difference, tbh.

Yes, they are.

Damsons are larger than bullace (which are about the size of large blueberries usually).

I thought bullace were generally much larger than sloes (which I would say are the size of large blueberries), also thought they were more spherical than Damsons.

I'd say sloes are about the size of medium blueberries. Maybe blueberries aren't the best comparison.

But in size terms (smallest first) it's sloes, bullace then damson.

👍🏽👍🏽

Oh great! Guessing I can make jams etc with them?

Indeed you can. I had some of the jam I made from the ones featured on the last page for breakfast this morning. It's really easy to make, as damsons are high in pectin so you can use normal sugar rather than specific jam-making sugar.

after the avocado chat on the previous page i happened upon one today, an absolute monster of a tree with hundreds of avocados on. the guy in whose garden it was growing asked me not to make the location known so i'll not say where it is. just a few days previous a massive section of it cracked and fell in the winds, still loads of tree and fruit left though. he planted it 20 years ago and says it still hasn't quite acclimatized to the uk, putting out fruit at strange times of the year, but this years crop looked pretty amazing the heat must have done it some favours. lucky guy. just needs to find a way to preserve some.

I don’t know where our squirrels be hiding but the tree at the end of our road is dropping hazelnuts like crazy. I will be back tomorrow with a dog poo bag.

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Great stuff, Dicki. That’s nice to hear.

Good haul of chestnuts in Petts Wood today

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South East London chestnuts are on form this year!

Fig/cuttings from the morning’s commute.

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wild garlic season
found a vast swath of the stuff on a recent ride. when does one pick it ? do you need to wait for it to flower or are young leaves fine to pick

The leaves are better before it flowers, imo. You can use the flowers in salads etc when they appear. I'm up in Galloway these days- can't move for the stuff.

Foraging principles: only 1 or 2 leaves per plant/ clump of leaves, then it will still catch enough Sun to flower, and maybe even produce seed.

https://www.instagram.com/p/CqYR-QOIULf

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the real pesto-heads know trofie is the best pasta shape

On topic, wild garlic is nice but we also have shit loads of three-cornered leek round here, anyone got some good recipes?