Eanna Ni Lamhna, the naturalist and broadcaster, once discovered a strawberry tree - Arbutus unedo - in a garden in the Berkeley Court apartments area in Dublin 4, a minor sensation she records in her book, Wild Dublin. Eanna Ni Lamhna, the naturalist and broadcaster, once discovered a strawberry tree - Arbutus unedo - in a garden in the Berkeley Court apartments area in Dublin 4, a minor sensation she records in her book, Wild Dublin. Near where I walk in southern Portugal, an arbutus sticks out here and there in scrub, its fruit crunched underfoot for insects and birds to plunder. Arbutus berries were then considered animal fodder. Virgil, in his Georgics, commanded that "goats shall have good store of arbutus boughs".

Source: Irish Independent November 24, 2019 07:07 UTC