Flowering from May, over 2,000 microspecies have been described for our native bramble, whose long, thorny, arching stems are a common sight in the cemetery.
It's a plant that provides an abundance of pollen and nectar to pollinating insects. Its leaves are eaten by caterpillars, and its ripe berries are eaten by small birds and mammals, the seeds being dispersed in the process.
Brambles - a 'management challenge'
Brambles pose a special challenge in Heene Cemetery and the response to them by the Friends is perhaps instructive. On the one hand, they provide riches aplenty to the habitat’s fauna: pollen and nectar for pollinating insects; vegetation for caterpillars; egg-laying surfaces for a myriad of insects; and, of course, fruit for birds and small mammals. Without brambles, Heene’s Local Wildlife Site habitat would have a poorer biodiversity.
On the other hand, brambles march ever onwards and, left alone, they would eventually smother everything else, leaving Heene Cemetery as it was before 2015 when the Friends first formed. Some form of ‘bramble management’ needs to be carried out, whilst consciously stopping well short of a complete grubbing-up. With its Local Wildlife Site status, Heene Cemetery is not going to return to being a traditionally tidy place, devoted to graves and monuments alone, which is how it was before its closure in 1977.
Between these two extremes lies a balanced position, although it is one that needs constant review.
Various areas of ‘deep bramble’ have been identified, and these are largely left alone. They function rather like engine rooms or crèches for the wildlife mentioned above. When bramble shoots emerge elsewhere – which is inevitable – we do our best to take them out.
From time to time, we are contacted by relatives of someone buried here, expressing a request to visit a particular grave. If the grave in question is in the middle of one of these ‘deep bramble’ areas, we will gladly cut a way through and tidy around the grave so that the family’s visit can take place properly. This matches the advice we’ve been given by Neil Hulme, butterfly expert and conservationist, which is that we cut into brambles to increase the peripheral surface that is preferred by butterflies, rather than cutting back.
Brambles, like many of the vigorous species that are to be found in Heene Cemetery (but not ‘invasive species’ – see our blog post on that topic), are to be loved but never given an entirely free pass.
Folklore and recipes
Crawling through brambles is said to get rid of blackheads, boils and eczema, but probably you just can't see them because of the blood from the scratches. Brambles were planted on graves to stop the dead from walking. To achieve good luck, and to cure ailments, walk under a briar that has arched over and taken root. Bramble stems were once used for binding, but first the thorns were stripped off by drawing the stems through a notch cut in the top of a fence post. They are a source of a black dye. Boiling the roots, which are dug up in Autumn, gives an astringent juice, and a decoction or cordial made from the fruit is used to treat mouth and throat soreness. An infusion of blackberry leaves, or the liquor from boiling the root bark in water, is good for intestinal infections like diarrhoea and dysentery.
Blackberries are rich in vitamin C, and also make a navy-blue dye. They can be turned into excellent wine, jelly, jam and pies, the latter famously in combination with apple. For most uses they can be combined with other berries such as rowan berries, elderberries, and sloes, and also crab apples. A traditional way to preserve the last blackberries of the season was to make blackberry wine. (More recipes follow in the Further information section below.)
