Saturday 10th June 2023 - Sad Day, Pocket Plum and What A Difference

Thursday was a sad day for us; one year since our dear old Barney died. He has left behind so many memories and we both feel that although he is gone, in so many ways, he is still with us. In his last days Barney lost his appetite but the evening before he left us, we had a BBQ (Barney loved a BBQ). He ate pork and sausage and we felt he was rallying but it was a different story the following day. I had hoped we would have a BBQ on Wednesday evening, with pork and sausages of course, but it was so cold we decided to leave it until the weekend when better weather was forecast.

There is a Mirabelle plum tree on one of the field edges we often walk along. Most years it is heavily laden with fruit and we, along with others, stop to pick a few to eat as we continue on our walk. However, this year the developing plums are distorted, see today’s photo below. When I picked one and split it open, the cavity which would normally contain the stone, was empty. I looked up ‘plum diseases’ on the internet and discovered the problem is called pocket plum https://www.rhs.org.uk/disease/pocket-plum. There are a few plums which are developing normally but I doubt if we will be picking many ripe plums this year.

There is a song which starts with the lyrics, ‘What a difference a day makes, twenty-four little hours.’ These words are very apt; yesterday’s cold winds and cloud have today been replaced with sun and warmth – and about time too! I have retrieved a pair of shorts and a lightweight top from the storage boxes under our bed, windows have been opened, definitely a day to spend in the garden and we are going to round it off with that BBQ we postponed from Wednesday.