Blackberry-picking

Late August, given heavy rain and sun
For a full week, the blackberries would ripen.
At first, just one, a glossy purple clot
Among others, red, green, hard as a knot.
You ate that first one and its flesh was sweet
Like thickened wine: summer’s blood was in it
Leaving stains upon the tongue and lust for
Picking. Then red ones inked up and that hunger
Sent us out with milk cans, pea tins, jam-pots
Where briars scratched and wet grass bleached our boots.
Round hayfields, cornfields and potato-drills
We trekked and picked until the cans were full,
Until the tinkling bottom had been covered
With green ones, and on top big dark blobs burned
Like a plate of eyes. Our hands were peppered
With thorn pricks, our palms sticky as Bluebeard’s.

We hoarded the fresh berries in the byre.
But when the bath was filled we found a fur,
A rat-grey fungus, glutting on our cache.
The juice was stinking too. Once off the bush
The fruit fermented, the sweet flesh would turn sour.
I always felt like crying. It wasn’t fair
That all the lovely canfuls smelt of rot.
Each year I hoped they’d keep, knew they would not.

Seamus Heaney

I think part of the fun of gardening is the gardening itself. Of course you have to do a lot of weeding but you get to do a lot of fun stuff too like harvesting your crops and watching them grow.

I would recommend having a garden to everyone – no matter how small a space you are working with.

Strawberries you can do quite easily in fairly small containers..however I’d recommend doing 4 or 5 bushs at least to get enough strawberries to be a small side dish for one person. As is nature, you have at any given time probably 1-2 strawberries on a bush in various states of ripening. So if you’re going to do it, don’t think one bush will cut it, You’ll get a strawberry or two at most at a time (good for a snack though)

Thanks for the link to Johnson’s Farm, Happy Rock. I’m not too far from there.

The problem is that every freakin creature, bug and fungus on the green earth loves to eat my plants. Any suggestions on some southeastern weather-proof fungus/bug repellent? It seems like I’ve got a different fungus for each plant, and the insects like them all

The berries in the picture also look delicious. Its a shame I live in the city and don’t have a car to get to any farms. I think they do have a farmer’s market nearby though, so I may have to get some at a more inflated price.

Johnson’s Farm in Southern New Jersey. Great place for those who are nearby, and fruit to pick from May through October. They also have something going on almost every weekend.

http://www.johnsonsfarm.com/pages/familyactivities.html

It cracks us up that the stores around here charge up to $4.00/pound for blackberries, a fruit that grows like a weed in the Willamette Valley. These can be had for free from nearly any backyard or any country roadside. Why on earth would I pay more for inferior fruit?