Happy times at the berries
WE told last week how the nation is going berry mad.
Sales have rocketed and they have become a billion pound bonanza, with a fifth of all fruit sales now berries.
We asked you to get in touch and let us know what your berry memories were – and you weren’t slow to tell us.
Here are a few of your fruity tales.
READING our feature took Isobel Turner back in time.
Back almost 75 years to when her strawberry and raspberry picking helped feed the nation through the dark days of the Second World War.
At 89, Isobel’s recollections of her school summer holiday activities are as sharp as ever.
As a 15-year-old picker Isobel, who now lives in Broughty Ferry, kept a diary. Her entries, from 1943 and 1944, paint a fascinating picture of the days when the berry harvest was crucial.
“It was the summer holidays and there wasn’t much to do during wartime,” said gran-of-three Isobel, who was born in 1927. “They’re really fond memories and we were also doing our bit.”
It was a month-long commitment during the season, with Isobel’s diary from 1944 showing she arrived on July 19 and stayed until August 12.
Accommodation was at Webster Seminary at Kirriemuir that year, previously it had been a farm near Blairgowrie.
The girls would pick into containers then carry their fruit to the edges of the fields to be weighed and then paid according to their efforts.
“They were long, hard days and half the time we were soaked to the skin,” recalls Isobel. “It was tough work.
“At the end of the day your hands were stained red with the juice of the berries.
“The only time we saw farm labourers was when we went to the hop in one of the local halls on a Saturday night.
“They were all there with their tight collars on, which looked awful, but they could fair do the Scottish dances!”