Berry Picking

Two decades ago, in another life, I loved berry picking. I would drive an hour or two to find a good berry patch. I hiked in the woods and checked out the bushes and forest floor for currants, blue berries, crowberries, highbush cranberries, lowbush cranberries, and salmonberries. It was delightful, except when it had rained and everyone got drenched picking berries. Then it was kind of cold.

Over the years my favorite berry patches became overgrown or too well-known. I didn't go out picking as often. Then my berry picking partner moved out-of-state. I gave up berry picking. :-(

But times are changing! I have new berry picking partners! I can find new berry patches. It'll be great--if it ever quits raining. (It has rained and rained and rained and rained!)

Mid-September is a little late to commit to berry picking, but there are still a few berries to be harvested. There is a patch of lingonberries (prime berries!) at the end of our driveway. How fortuitous is that?!  I noticed the patch the first summer after we moved in, but it wasn't much of a producer. This year there was a bumper crop of berries, but the patch is only 10 feet by 10 feet so there aren't gallons of berries to be picked. Given the children's ages, the patch was about the right size.

Today the older trio went out on their own and harvested a few of the berries, then I and all five children went back down the driveway and collected more berries. Technically the berry patch is on the neighbor's property, but he never visits the far edge of his property, so I appropriated them. Unfortunately I haven't found any good patches on our property. Do you think I could transplant some of his plants to our patch of woods? I think the real problem is a lack of sunlight in our woods. Berries loves sun. Without enough sun, there are no berries.

Okay, back to our berry picking adventure. Bentley is a very focused picker and picked the most. Jake is a hard worker, too, and did a great job. Viva is a butterfly. Even after I gave her two handfuls that I picked (doubling her take), her berry bowl was sad looking. It's a good thing we aren't subsistence pickers. 

Lincoln wasn't a good picker, either. He wandered around stepping on berries and stressing about Evan. Evan was focused on berry picking like Bentley, only he ate all the berries he picked. After a while, I started worrying about deadly mushrooms. What if there was one in the berry patch and Evan found it and ate it? I scooped him up and that was the end of his fun. (Do you think deadly mushrooms are that common? I'm going to go google it.)