Apples and Thrushes

Byfield Pocket Park is situated on land once occupied by our railway station, sadly closed to passenger trains in May,1948. Adjacent to the station was a small orchard and a few apple trees survive, some of considerable size. They still bear a decent crop of apples and, as no one harvests them, they eventually fall to the ground to be feasted on by blackbirds, fieldfares and the occasional redwing. All these birds are types of thrush, saddled with the unfortunate Latin name of Turdus - a fact which seems not to trouble them. 

A little earlier today I visited the garden of my next-door neighbour, Margaret. She unfortunately took a fall a few days ago, fracturing her hip, and I went around with a "Get Well Soon" card. Her apple tree still bore lots of fruit, and I wasn't the only one to have noted this for fieldfares and blackbirds were tucking in. There will soon be little remaining but, in ingesting the fruit they will also have swallowed some seeds. These may be voided at some distance from the parent plant to give another source of "crab apples" (see blog for 10th December).