Wimbledon fortnight is set to be bigger, sweeter and juicier than last year - and that is just the strawberries, according to experts.
Slathered in fresh cream, the summer fruit is a staple of the tennis tournament, and British growers say this year's crop will be earlier, bigger and sweeter than in 2013, as a result of the fifth warmest winter on record.
With the mild winter and Mediterranean temperatures this spring, ample supplies of home-grown strawberries will be on supermarket shelves three weeks earlier than last year.
Growers up and down the country also estimate that there will be a 10 percent increase in strawberry production compared to last year, despite the wettest winter in 250 years.
British Summer Fruits, the industry body that represents 98 percent of berries in supermarkets, reports that not only will it be an earlier and larger crop of British strawberries but consumers can also expect the berries to taste sweeter and juicier than normal.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article