Country diary: A blossom-laden spring to make up for last year
After five days away near the sun-dazzled Solent, we returned home to a verdant haven. Fruit blossom has dropped with some apples already set; and the 50-year-old Judas tree is covered with purple flowers, vivid against diaphanous beech and swags of native May tree.
Before going upcountry, I walked on my mended hip in James Evans and Mary Martin's documented and tended orchard of historic fruit trees (200 apples, 30 cherries and 10 pears). This year's succession of prolific blossom is particularly beautiful, helped by a sunny March, and in such contrast to last year's wet and unproductive spring.
Apple is the latest to open, heralded by the large pink and white blooms of the pear apple (Snub Nose). But it is the creamy coloured blossom of pears that came first, including Belle de Bruxelles, now more than 40ft high and laden with blossom to the topmost tips. It was grafted from a twig, cut from an overgrown specimen surviving in the old garden of a pub in nearby Launceston. The spreading Morwellham pear was grafted at the same time from a chance seedling, found growing in the wall of a derelict lime kiln on the Devon bank of the Tamar. Hoverflies dart about its blossom and shiny pale leaves, and there should be a good crop of medium-sized golden-red fruit.
The delicate fluffiness of white cherry blossom diminishes among the opening orange-tinged foliage, while avenues of Burcombe, Birchenhayes, Fice, Rumbullion and Smutts form flowering canopies, spread above sturdy trunks. Years of pruning in the winter months has shaped the branches in this maturing orchard to allow occasional mechanical trimming of the flowery sward (sheep were tried at first but they preferred to graze the immature trees). After a three-year dearth of cherries, there is hope for a bumper harvest; perhaps the triple-legged ladders will be erected and another deep freeze needed to store surplus fruit.
Further down the valley, in a steep tributary of the Cotehele millstream, the council's Forest for Cornwall are planting a random mix of young trees. Included are old sorts of apples and cherries that will add diversity and mystery to this expanse of future woodland.
Under the Changing Skies: The Best of the Guardian's Country Diary, 2018-2024 is published by Guardian Faber; order at guardianbookshop.com and get a 15% discount
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