Nuts!

Well, it's been a while since any blogs got blogged about here, and alongside the fine autumn weather which keeps me happily away from a computer, my top excuse is that I've been busy...
busy increasing GDP?  No, not exactly, but busy investing in my nut supplies during the harvest season.

For the urban gatherer there's a vast amount of bounty to be found dropping into parks and lining the footpaths in autumn.  Walnuts, hazelnuts, chestnuts...
The keen gatherer keeps an eye on the weather and delights in the promise of a windy night which will bring down a belly filling delight the next morning.  You have to be early, though.  Funnily enough I've never actually seen anyone else at the local trees.  However, very often they've been cleaned up bright and early, so it turns into a treasure hunt / race against the anonymous gatherers out there in the void.

A great haul of walnuts this year has led to thinking up rat and possum-proof ways to store them.  You need to let them dry in them sun to ripen, but the furry friends like to help themselves over night.  Hence various contraptions have turned functionality of nut storage into creative garden art.