Suddenly our fruit trees are bursting with flowers, and our ducks are hiding their eggs in the vain hope of hatching some. (There are no drakes...)These flowers are on one of the nashi trees - we have two different varieties, this one is more yellow and thinner skinned. In a well-ordered universe I would have the names on file somewhere...

The top one was snapped by the cow - she had been grazing on lead and saw something tasty (new growth on the nashi tree) and made a lunge for it. Cows are quite big. And hard to dissuade... Fortunately she snapped the tree just above the graft and the subsequent leader growth has been trained into a graceful umbrella shape, less than a metre from the ground. Easy for grandchildren to pick...

So the cow has mooved on to a new home (this is not a euphemism, she's living over Brighton way) and the trees flourish. The other nashi - having avoided such rough treatment - is nowhere near as elegantly shaped, but we're working on it. 

My dad had done this to the Packham's Triumph pear at the house I grew up in. By the time I came along it was well and truly umbrella-ed, and picking was really easy. So was climbing, and even pruning! Also sitting underneath with a fistful of gooseberries and peas in the pod, and a good book...

So the umbrella-ing is worth a crack I think. Our pear trees are looking quite columnar however, so I may be too late!