Today is the traditional day people stop picking blackberries in the British Isles. Knowing what was safe to eat and when to pick it was very important to people in days gone by. Hedgerows were used more as a source of food than they are today and as people had no access to calendars like we do, a recognisable sign was needed to make sure the berries were at their best and didn’t make people ill. The church split the year into quarters using the Saints Days, St Michael’s Day (also known as Michaelmas Day) on October 10th was one of the four Quarter Days which divided up the year. Parishioner’s recognised these Saints days and so regarded this as a sensible cut off point for berry picking. However following a calendar change in 1752 when 11 days were removed from the calendar, St Michael’s day now falls on 29th September. Traditionally, it was regarded safer not to pick blackberries after Michaelmas because St Michael was the saint who cast the devil out of heaven, the devil having then landed in a blackberry bush. It used to be thought that any blackberries left on the bushes at the end of Michaelmas Day would be spit on and cursed by the devil making them poisonous. In actual fact by 10th October, most blackberries are already well past their best, but some people still look for any remaining decent berries on this day to bake things such as blackberry and apple pie/cake or maybe make a bramble (blackberry) or hedgerow jelly.
If you can’t find any blackberries perhaps you could be tempted to knit a 1:12th scale Blackberry throw and cushion, this takes its name from the stitch pattern which resembles the texture of the blackberry.