An abundance of Berries

The weather this week has been so grey and misty that the beautiful sunny days we enjoyed in the Autumn seem quite a distant memory.  But thinking back, when I was out on my bike a few weeks ago, I couldn’t help noticing that many of the trees had already lost their leaves.  Of those that hadn’t, I think the beeches were the stars of the show, smooth, grey boles reaching up to a green-gold canopy gleaming against a cloudless blue sky.

But the lack of leaves highlighted the abundance of berries: hips, haws, rowans, sloes.    Even the pyracantha in my garden is covered in berries, the first time for years!   It is, I understand, a result of the hot, dry spell earlier in the year which subjected the trees to such a degree of stress that they put extra effort into fruit-bearing, just in case it is their last opportunity to produce seed.

Let us not grow weary in well-doing, but redeem the time! 

Blessed is the man who trusts in the LORD, and whose hope is the LORD.  For he shall be like a tree planted by the waters, which spreads out it roots by the river, and will not fear when heat comes; but her leaf will be green, and will not be anxious in the year of drought, nor will cease from yielding fruit.   Jeremiah 17:7-8