Pruning silver birch

[sime42]

53 minutes ago, coppice cutter said:

I done it once and found it pretty underwhelming if I'm honest.

 

 

This is also true. I made it myself many years later and was underwhelmed by it. I thought maybe I'd not quite hit it at the right time as the sap tasted pretty much like water, a very slight sweetness. Still, the idea and process of making the wine is worth a go at least once. It might just be rose tinted memories but I found the whole experience pleasing.

 

[sime42]

7 minutes ago, Mick Dempsey said:

Ummmmm. This is why one should read back over what ones written before hitting the submit button!

[coppice cutter]

1 hour ago, spudulike said:

I'm moving!! Not because of the trees but thought I would swerve it this year but the feckers are dropping early. I have driven 100 miles and opened the car boot....it is like a shower of those fecking little seeds and all of them ending up in my car.

Go in to our bathrooms and turn the fan on....more of the feckers, leave the windows on the latch.....you've guessed it......Grrrrrr

I planted about 400 of the rascals, but they mustn't have reached the stage of doing that yet as I've never noticed anything.

[spudulike]

12 hours ago, coppice cutter said:

I planted about 400 of the rascals, but they mustn't have reached the stage of doing that yet as I've never noticed anything.

Well when they do....don't park your car under them. I retrieved half a bucket of shyte from my cars two front wings after removing the expanded rubber inserts....all leaves and seeds and have only had it around 5 years.

400.....masochist!!

[peds]

13 hours ago, sime42 said:

This is also true. I made it myself many years later and was underwhelmed by it. I thought maybe I'd not quite hit it at the right time as the sap tasted pretty much like water, a very slight sweetness. Still, the idea and process of making the wine is worth a go at least once. It might just be rose tinted memories but I found the whole experience pleasing.

 

Every year I find myself without the time to harvest any birch or sycamore sap, but when I do get around to it, I've heard it's worthwhile adding a few freezer fruits or seasonal flowers to the brew.

Same as mead... it's nice, but it's better if you add something extra to help it along.

[sime42]

23 minutes ago, peds said:

Every year I find myself without the time to harvest any birch or sycamore sap, but when I do get around to it, I've heard it's worthwhile adding a few freezer fruits or seasonal flowers to the brew.

Same as mead... it's nice, but it's better if you add something extra to help it along.

Yeah, the recipe I used included lemons and oranges. I think most of the flavour came from them.

[peds]

My goal is gorse and primrose flowers, but you'd have to gather an absolute shed load to flavour a gallon of sap.

 

I think you need to boil it down to concentrate it a bit before you get any worthwhile strength or flavour, without adding any extra sugar.

 

But yeah, I've never found it near the top of my to do list at the appropriate time, so I'm yet to try it myself. 

[Mick Dempsey]

18 hours ago, coppice cutter said:

I done it once and found it pretty underwhelming if I'm honest.

 

 

I reckon before the growing of sugar in the New World it was very rare and expensive to get something sweet to eat or drink. So a bit of even mildly sweet birch juice would have been very welcome to our forefathers.

[Mark Bolam]

They must have had Rolo’s Mick, and Toblerones.

They’ve been around for ages.

[Mick Dempsey]

Who really ate Toblerones? (Apart from Alan Partridge)