LETTERS
BRANCHING OUT
The article about rook pie brought back memories (By hook or by rook, 20 May). Nearly 60 years ago there was a tradition among the local farming community of going on ‘brancher’ shoots to thin out the local rook population that was then considered a pest.
These shoots at different rookeries were co-ordinated to take place on the same day, from 7 May until the branchers had fledged or the fresh, fast-growing leaves hid them from view. Old-timers who took part recounted that, in the depression and during the war, branchers were considered a tasty windfall, though by the 1960s only a few ended in the pot. An elderly lady I knew used to
