Hips, haws and rosellas

"The first thing you need to know about the Hawthorn berries is you should not eat the seeds. They contain cyanide bonded with sugar, called amygdalin. In your gut — actually small intestine — that changes to hydrogen cyanide and can be deadly. You can cook the berries then discard the seeds, but don’t eat the seeds."

Eat the Weeds

I wonder if this rosella knows that? Or does it spit out the seeds?

Every year at this time, the hawthorn tree outside the window behind my computer attracts rosellas. Common but beautiful, and to an English born lady, hugely exotic. Their colours are just amazing. And this morning they seemed so close I couldn't resist taking some photographs. Initially it was this view that attracted me - the markings on the back of the bird and that long blue tail ...

It was so stunningly beautiful that I just had to make it the topic of today's post somehow.

Well I've done rosehips I think - when I did roses. So this time I decided to do haws and also Rosella - the food company (though I later decided to save that for tomorrow). Because although 'hips and haws' is a very English expression, rosellas are very Australian and Rosella, the company is an Australian icon. It's the logo for Arnott's biscuits too - though not the same kind of rosella.

Haw means a hedge apparently and the tree does indeed have thorns. I think it is considered a weed here. I'm not sure whether there are any native species here. There is certainly more than one kind of hawthorn. And, incidentally they are from the same genus as roses, so not so far apart as you might think. I think in England we called them May trees or May flowers - probably because they bloomed in May. Very pretty but with a not very pleasant smell - a bit like the fruit - also pretty but not really very tasty, and apparently also potentially poisonous.

hawthorn flowers

hawthorn berries

I could direct you to some recipes but really it's probably not worth it. There didn't really seem to be that much enthusiasm for doing things with it out there. Although I gather it is supposed to be good for the heart and does have lots of Vitamin C. The website Eat the Weeds had the best overall summary of it that I found and is worth a look. Indeed the title of this website (Eat the weeds) is quite tantalising. I should have another look because, as you probably know by now, I'm a fan of weeds, even though I get great satisfaction from weeding.

And then I found this lovely quote which aroused a bit of childhood nostalgia in me.

“We could never have loved the earth so well if we had had no childhood in it, if it were not the earth where the same flowers come up again every spring that we used to gather with our tiny fingers as we sat lisping to ourselves on the grass, the same hips and haws on the autumn hedgerows, the same redbreasts that we used to call ‘God’s birds’ because they did no harm to the precious crops. What novelty is worth that sweet monotony where everything is known and loved because it is known?” George Eliot

All that tramping the hedgerows looking for blackberries and elderberries and other weedy things. And the hawthorn hedge that lined the trip to school and which I used to wriggle along behind, avoiding the thorns as I went. Well in my head they were hawthorns, but maybe they weren't. The hedge stood away from a fence a tiny bit and it was possible to wriggle your way along the back for what seemed like a very long way. It was probably a few yards. It was sort of a tunnel. I'm talking primary school here. But here in Australia the hawthorn means rosellas to me.

And Rosella is the name of an Australian tinned food manufacturer. It's name and its logo is an Australian icon. And I was going to write something about it here. But I think it deserves its own post. Tomorrow. For now it's all about my home-grown Crimson Rosellas and the hawthorn bush outside my window. A reminder that autumn is here. That everything changes and yet remains the same. Good and bad.