MIDSUMMER AT BRYNM ERIIERYN and I have shopping to do around the neighbourhood before the grandchildren arrive for their summer break. First a visit to the farm shop in Lampeter, where the Soil Association began, and it goes without saying that all the produce is organic and local. Then, on the way home, a detour along the coast for mussels and mackerel, cheapest fish on the slab, from the fishmonger in Aberaeron, whose supplies come direct from the fishermen of Haverfordwest.
The glory of summer at Brynmerheryn is the wildflower meadow. I take no responsibility for its random flowerings and have no control over what thrives or fails. At the time of planting some fifteen years ago, the seed was supplied by Miriam Rothschild – not yet a dame but soon to become so – pioneering biologist and, in her time, the world’s foremost authority on fleas. The cropping came from Dr Miriam’s own wildflower meadow at Ashton Wold in Northamptonshire, an experimental enterprise under constant revision. Because I was working for her as an illustrator at the time of replanting Brynmerheryn’s garden – drawing butterflies as well as fleas, since her interest was restoring Britain’s wildflower meadows – a sack of seeds came with the territory.
