Re: Medlar/Fall colors
The best use my granny had for medlar was to put the fruit in the cupboards
or drawers, together with lavender flowers and other scented herbs -they
smell good and last long. Also, they can be put on the mantelpiece, on
heaters, on window sills and left there to send their scent in the room. The
jelly is not bad and here they use to make very hard preserves that are cut
in squares like little bricks, or in funny shapes (stars, hearts) and mixed
with other bon-bons. I remember eating them as a child. I agree the tree is
beautiful, we have a very old one here and its is lovely both in flower and
in the Fall, specially when -if- a cold Autumn makes the leaves take
gorgeous colors.
BTW, I wanted to ask what are your most successful plants for Autumn color?
I mean, if you want to create a "continental" autumn effect, what do you
use? I am not referring to flowers -of course we all have lots of things in
bloom well into the Fall- but to leaves and fruits. Here, for instance, we
cannot rely on Maples -eccept perhaps some- or Liquidambars, but Dyospiros
kaki turn a gorgeous red, some rose hips are great and of course old
favourites like Pyracanthas produce abundant crops of berries. I grow a
lovely vine - Ampelopsis aconitifolia- whose berries start the palest of sky
blues, turn TURQUOISE with little dark spots, then turn purple and finish
their life dark blue. The single berry is small in size, but they hang in
clusters of 6-8 all in different growth stages and so in different colors:
quite a lovely sight.
Alessandra
