Damson Gin
- By Haidee Clarke
- •
- 02 Apr, 2019
- •
Today we are mostly feeling..... satisfied!
Well maybe contemplating the Clarke 2019 vintage of Damson Gin is a little premature in April but there's no harm in planning! Sustainability on a smallholding doesn't stop at the veg garden. All areas need to be put to use. One such area for us was a small patch of no-mans-land in the chicken field. Owing to the topography and the boundary of stone walls, we have difficulty fencing right to the extremities and in some circumstances this causes small patches of land that are not one thing or another (and we try to avoid this). This little patch is one of those and we are creating a damson grove.
We have a small whippet of a tree that suckered from a grand damson in our last garden and we have grown this on in a pot over the past 3 years. This finally was planted and it probably out there having a mini part of its own. We also planted a larger, more established tree that was already planted here and we inherited when we moved in. That second planting was quite an epic manoeuvre - cutting it back (spiky little critter), digging it out from the bank at the bottom of the yard (we just managed to get the tree move done before the end of the tree moving window!) and then carrying it up to the chicken field. But its in (despite the scratched and bruising) and the bit of rain we have just had will help it establish.
We did manage to harvest the forced rhubarb too. We uncovered it and cut it back. As it is its first year in the ground in that bed, we need to leave it to grow and die back naturally so that the root gets more energy for next season (although a few cheeky little nibbles wont hurt!). We had it just how nature intended..... just as it is. It was gone in 60 seconds!
That was a weekends work, but its an area finished..... and we packed up on Sunday evening with an air of satisfaction.
We have a small whippet of a tree that suckered from a grand damson in our last garden and we have grown this on in a pot over the past 3 years. This finally was planted and it probably out there having a mini part of its own. We also planted a larger, more established tree that was already planted here and we inherited when we moved in. That second planting was quite an epic manoeuvre - cutting it back (spiky little critter), digging it out from the bank at the bottom of the yard (we just managed to get the tree move done before the end of the tree moving window!) and then carrying it up to the chicken field. But its in (despite the scratched and bruising) and the bit of rain we have just had will help it establish.
We did manage to harvest the forced rhubarb too. We uncovered it and cut it back. As it is its first year in the ground in that bed, we need to leave it to grow and die back naturally so that the root gets more energy for next season (although a few cheeky little nibbles wont hurt!). We had it just how nature intended..... just as it is. It was gone in 60 seconds!
That was a weekends work, but its an area finished..... and we packed up on Sunday evening with an air of satisfaction.