Seasonality

'La Nina Summer, Ground Ecology'. ©2008. Nicola Moss. 1120x1520.

This weekend I savoured the taste of the first ripe mulberry for the season. The change of seasons is something I really enjoy, a continuous pattern of changing produce from our home garden; different birds visiting, the fragrance of flowering plants. I could go on, but essentially what makes it special for me is that these seasonal occurrences are not all year round; they may occur for a couple of weeks or months and then it is time for something else to flourish. There is an ongoing cycle of savouring what is happenning now and anticipating what is about to come.

So Mulberry season is just beginning, this means I will have about a week of eating before the birds work out fruit is ripening. Then I need to be up at sunrise and down to the tree if I want my share of the crop. I don't mind sharing, as long as I get some. When the Mulberry tree is in fruit our garden is visited by birds, such as figbirds, that we don't see at other times of the year. I wonder how they know, is our tree mapped in their GPS systems some how. Does a little bell go off in their seasonal travels telling them it's time to visit our garden?

In my mind Mulberry season means that the eagerly anticipated Asparagus season is very close. In my opinion you cannot have too much asparagus growing in your garden. The first beautiful green spears are eaten straight from the ground, so sweet they don't need cooking. Following on from this will be broad bean season and Costa Romanesque zucchini season, and so on....this is the kind of yearly calendar I like to live with.