Early in October, I went on a recce to P.H Coate & Son’s Willow & Wetlands Centre, planning to return and photograph the wicker harvest. As you can probably guess, the harvest was delayed due to severe flooding, which saw Coate’s withy fields under two to three feet of water for many weeks.

With the water receded, the guys had to race to harvest the withy quickly before it flowered and became unsuitable for basket making. The image here shows John Dyer and Malcolm Musgrove taking a well-earned break from gathering the withy — titled, appropriately, “A Late Willow Harvest.”