Jostaberry picking

Glut time. It’s jostaberry season. And white currant season. And black currant season. It’s all go here in the soft fruit orchard.

And in case you have spluttered tea all over the keyboard – yes. A beautifully composed photo.  That is not right. Where are the indistinct shots of vague bits of fruit in a sea of green?

Like this.

Oh, the joy of a houseguest who is a wonderful photographer. We had Neal Mackintosh for a long weekend of cycling, swimming and great company.

I’m giving him an acknowledgement because I haven’t worked out how to write Copyright Neal Mackintosh over all the pictures here.

He has very generously let me use some of his snaps for the blog.  Aren’t we lucky? You get a proper photo essay at last. And we got a lovely guest.

Can you imagine? Coming on sunset and Neal asked if there was anything he could do. I suspect he was thinking in terms of washing up and table setting. Hah!

‘Go outside and photograph my garden’, I begged.

It’s not every day you get an artist in among your weeds. And it’s not everyday you get to see the mundane task of watering.

Or hose hauling. Which is what happens here. We only have two taps for the entire garden. Two taps for about five acres.

I actually have an automatic watering system in this lower potager. But I set it for an intermittent once very three days back in May when we were having lush and extravagant rainfall.

I haven’t set it for the big dry which is what we are enjoying now. Please remind me to reset it tomorrow.

I know what the forecast is and what it will be: hot and dry. And yes, I do change my head-gear about three times a day. Did you spot that?  One hat for picking in the late evening. This larger canvas one during the hotter parts of the day.

A peaked hat if I’m mowing. But I’m not mowing right now. Too hot. Even early.

Next post we will follow Neal as he wanders about snapping flower pics. I for one can’t wait.