Blueberry

[fortis70]

Daily mail 3 april 2019 blueberry?yes and no the answer is obviously SLOE but why? Could some kind soul enlighten me thanks in advance

[scorpiojo]

A sloe is a blue berry, but not a blueberry.

[dannyk13]

Sloe is a berry and it is blue coloured.

[Togo]

Just an aside. I have seen a similar clue that reads "Blackberry yes or no". 4. Answer. Blue.

[dannyk13]

Togo, I think blue would be the wrong answer and sloe would be correct which fits the clue.

[Togo]

Agree Danny....I submitted Sloe. Just saying that I have seen another version of the clue where the answer was indeed blue.

[dannyk13]

Would like to know how that answer would have been parsed.

[Togo]

Cannot remember the exact wording of the clue Danny but, Blackberry, Yes, No, was in it. eg. Blackberry yes. No.

[fortis70]

thank you very much scorpio danny togo et al, very interesting responses but i am not convinced that this a fine example of the setter's art. all very iffy and in my humble opinion it is only cryptic with a very large slice of poetic licence. thank you all again for taking the trouble to field an explanation, merci encore!!

[dannyk13]

Fortis, there is no setter at the Mail. The crosswords are set by a joint effort of the office staff.

[fortis70]

well danny, thank you very much for letting me know. that now explains quite a lot. i also do the daily telegraph and the times as well as the sundays. for some years now i have noticed that some of the clues in the telegraph come up in the daily mail, although with barely disguised differences. i can't say that i have ever noticed a typical times clue in the daily mail. the times are totally different and although sometimes hard to parse, they always do parse perfectly, but you have to work on them! thank you very much again and kind regards