[willowman]

Just been down and picked my first real crop of goosegogs.
2 years ago they were attacked by mildew/fungus.
Last year the dreaded gooseberry saw fly got them.
This year I took all precautions, including building a fruit cage from scrap materials.
So I had a good crop from my one bush.
And the valuable lesson I learnt........... yes, you've guessed it.
Next time choose a thornless variety.

[Livinhope]

But we have to keep the old varieties of fruit veg and flowers going or these things become extinct.  Now someone will tell me they're all crosses  anyway:P.

Kiss it better and wear gloves next time.

[vet]

Having just picked the last of my gooseberries, I couldn't agree more.

[willowman]

I've just remembered a saying I read recently -
"Don't complain that the rose bush has thorns, rejoice that the thorn bush produces roses"

I suppose that could be said also of the gooseberry bush.

By the way, the goosegogs were just wonderful. They were on the point of going past their best, but I caught them in time. Biting into them produced an initial burst of sweetness followed by just a taste of sourness. Great. Brought back so many memories of childhood. Worth the pain.

[Livinhope]

A fellow scrumper then?

[nilsatis1964]

My wife reckons that the gooseberries I pick would taste different if they didn't have my blood on them.  My 2 girls 6 and 7 like to repeat my warning to them to be careful because gooseberries have thorns.  Their little hands are well able to pick without being touched.

[shokkyy]

My bushes have got loads of thorns but I think I've got the knack of picking them now with no injury. I just grab the end of each shoot/branch between thorns, lift it up and with my other hand I can easily pick all the goosegogs bunched on the underside of it. As long as I keep hold of it so it stays still and it's bent away from the fruit, I never get the thorns. I got 5 kilos this year, best crop ever, after several years of attack from sawfly.

[willowman]

Definitely a scrumper.
Scrumped fruit always tasted better than bought fruit.
Usually gave me stomach ache though.
Apples, pears, plums, we had the lot, often from the vicarage garden.

[willowman]

shokyy,
how on earth do you top and tail 5 kilos of gooseberries?

[Livinhope]

Small pair of scissors and a lot of patience.    or have a topping and tailing party. :blink:

[hamstergbert]

Do children today still scrump?  I know of several apple trees etc that are overhanging the public path and at least one plum tree ditto that never get picked, either by the owners of said trees or by scrumping kids.  I can only assume that either the latest generation of children are too honest to steal someone elese's fruit, or alternatively that they are too indulged already such that they don't need to put in the effort to get their sour apples that way, preferring instead to fester playing computer games etc.

(I will no doubt have it pointed out that fruit accessible from public paths is barely classed as scrumping.  Very true - half of the fun fifty, sixty years ago was the frisson of risk!)

[Livinhope]

What do you mean, a frisson.  We had to run across an open field and dodge a flock of angry geese, but Oh!, the fun of outwitting the orchard owner and the geese. 

I think kids these days are over indulged.  It's easier to blag a fiver off the old man and go down the shop.  I wouldn't be a kid now, the fun we had, the exercise and the sense of achievement.  Got caught up a tree once by my knickers and my 'friends' ran off.....b*****s.

'nother thing people don't grow fruit trees now.

[Coach]

Last time I went scrumping was 50 years ago I was 21 and on a Junior NCOs course at a Military camp by the banks of the Exe in Devon. The apples were minging they were as sour as sour can be!!!

[willowman]

Funny how all us oldies have fond memories of scrumping, but it was actually stealing.
I suppose the thing was we never took more than we needed, no stripping the trees bare, just the odd couple of apples etc, and we didn't need to sell them to get money for drugs.
And as others have said, half the fun was just getting the things without being seen, a bit like door knocking - but thats yet another subject for a different discussion.

[mumofstig]

I remember playing 'knock down ginger'  .........but hate it when the kids do it now 

How times change