Blueberries

Our good neighbor, Kathy, invited us to go pick wild blueberries with her today. We drove to a timbered area owned by a paper company that had been clear cut a few years ago. This tends to promote blueberry growth, since they do not much care for the shade that timbers provide. These little guys, based on some tasting-during-picking experience, seem to be much more flavorful and sweeter than purchased blueberries. The only downside is that they are small, ranging from about the size of a BB to something like large peas. Here is an example of what they look like. We saw two species intermingled, some the usual bluish color and others almost black.

Here are the girls getting set to start filling their buckets.

Gosh, I have to say it takes a lot of picking of these little things to fill a gallon bucket! It took me awhile to cover the bottom of my bucket and my back was already asking me how long it would have to be bent over. I felt like I hadn't even made a dent in the task. However, I did become more proficient. There definitely are some tricks to picking blueberries. Doing them one at a time is not the way to go. When you can focus on clusters of them and roll, rather than pick, several off the plant at one time, it goes much faster. After about two hours, Kathie and I each had about 3/4 of a gallon of them. I think Kathy, on the other hand, managed to do a gallon all on her own (she is holding my bucket, not her full gallon).

Well, maybe Kathie got 3/4 of a gallon and I got 2/3 of a gallon. She may be more adept at these fine motor skills.

Nevertheless, we'll be having some serious blueberry experiences over the next several days and months (we will freeze some). Blueberry pancakes are definitely in my future, as well as a peach/blueberry cobbler (thanks to Mary Herr), blueberries on cereal, blueberries on ice cream, blueberry smoothies, and whatever else we can dream up. YUM!

The only question that remains for us is, "Why didn't the bears eat all of them before we got there?"