The crabs

Having mentioned crab apple jelly yesterday at reference 1, earlier this afternoon I passed what I think is a crab apple tree at the end of our road, on the way back from Stamford Green pond where we had been feeding a spot of rolled oats to the water fowl. Crab apples all over the road, and over a car parked underneath.

So I thought I would take some of the low hanging fruit. Helped along by a lady opposite supplying me with a plastic bag - she was concerned that I might dirty my sun hat - I soon had nearly four pounds of them. Just enough to fill our largest saucepan nicely, along with a bit more than a pound of sugar. So far.

Beam - that is to say a length of timber which was once part of the roof of our garden shed - now erected in the kitchen for suspension of jelly bag.

Five jam jars retrieved from ironmongery storage duties in the garage, which they have been carrying out undisturbed for some years now. I was impressed how easily they cleaned up: glass is clearly a superior material for making containers.

Bing consulted, and it seems quite likely that the fruit is crab apple. Reassured by lots of talk of their making excellent jam and jelly and no talk of toxic varieties or relatives.

We shall see whether the product lives up to my memories of the stuff.

PS: tweeted a couple of Egyptian geese at the pond. At least, what I knew to be such after consulting Bing. No mistaking the brown patches around the eyes, the bright brown feathers rear and the red legs. And Wikipedia reminds me that they are really a sort of large duck, called geese in this country on account of their being large for ducks. But I wonder now whether the rules committee would allow a tweet of something unknown which only becomes known after the event?

Reference 1: http://psmv4.blogspot.com/2020/08/a-black-reverie.html.

Reference 2: https://pumpkinstrokemarrow.blogspot.com/2011/03/dead-flies.html. An early sighting of an Egyptian goose. Although my memory is of a large grey duck or a small grey goose with a long neck with ruffled feathers. A bird I cannot now trace at all. Tiresome.