And so Begins the Great Cherrytree Wars...

It is that time of year again when I arm myself with as many old wives tales as possible and head on outside to with a very large stick to defend the right for the cherries on my tree to mature and ripen into the correct eating age. Last year I didn't have the heart to do it and let nature run its course. The result was that we ate not a single cherry.

Cherries are a passion of mine. And like peaches, I refuse to purchase them from the shop. I wait patiently and watch the trees bloom and develop and mature. I am addicted to anticipation I think. I cannot stand to eat a shop bought cherry or peach because there is no anticipation what so ever involved with walking into a shop and buying it. For me I need to dream about their maturity. To me the first plucked cherry from the tree is like (I would imagine) a glass of the most expensive champagne.

So last week I hung old CDs in the cherry tree. The theory is that birds don't like the constant flashing created by the sun hitting the discs. Since I only had a couple of old CDs, I also hung up some plastic bags. This creates annoying noise and constant movement when the wind blows. Really good ideas I thought - then the birds moved in! Just as the cherries were moving from a pink blush to a more embarrassing shade of red.

Today I am trying a different approach. Today I will be tying the plastic bags around the bunches of cherries. So out there I went with an armload of bags to discover that there were a LOT more cherries in the tree than I first suspected!

Oh joy of joys - it looks like I just may be getting my first real taste of cherries this year after all!!