This post is about Hawthorn, the plant, not the footy club which is nowhere as good as Collingwood.

On Sunday Jo and I went collecting Hawes which are the fruit of the Common Hawthorn. The plan is to propagate them and plant them around the boundary of our farm in hedgerows as a living fence to start with and then divide up the block into paddocks with hedgerows.

There are a number of reasons for using Hawthorns.

• Bee fodder from the flowers in spring.
• The thorns are long and sharp and apparently make the hedge impenetrable to animals and zombies (handy when for the zombie apocalypse comes)
• The fruit can be used for wine, and preserves
• The wood is good firewood
• It is pretty
• And most importantly Hawthorns are where the Faeries live at the bottom of your garden – it’s all about bio-diversity.

A bucket full of Hawes

Pulling the seed out of the Haw is a bit tedious but turns the water a lovely colour. Perhaps they would make a nice natural dye.

Lots of seeds ready for my rocket pots which I find are great. Everything I have propagated in them so far has grown really well when planted out.

According to Monty Don the British gardener the seeds need a cold period in order to germinate in Spring which is good as there is no shortage of cold here at the moment.

Cheers

Franky