Skip to Content.
Sympa Menu

homestead - Re: [Homestead] Blueberries

homestead AT lists.ibiblio.org

Subject: Homestead mailing list

List archive

Chronological Thread  
  • From: Lisa Kae Van Meter Perry <lisakvperry AT gmail.com>
  • To: homestead AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [Homestead] Blueberries
  • Date: Sun, 17 Jun 2012 21:26:50 -0400

On Sun, Jun 17, 2012 at 3:52 PM, Gene GeRue <genegerue AT ruralize.com> wrote:

> Lisa Perry, you still here?
>

Gene!

I'm here! :) We just returned from the Salem Red Sox baseball game to
celebrate Father's Day with our sons (now 22 & nearly 17). Salem's Sox are
a farm team for Boston located in Salem, VA which is sort of a sister city
to Roanoke.

The timing of your post is a nice coincidence because I thought of you,
too, just last week and wondered what the heck you are up to.

>
> With substantially-home-produced goodies, we just consumed a fine meal.
> For accoustical ambience I selected Scott's album, 8 Miles to Perryville.
> Which of course reminded me of you. Which reminded me of your substantial
> blueberry experience. I am very close to throwing up my hands and admitting
> apple and blueberry production failure, due partly to more items on my menu
> than time to enjoy them--the inevitable time challenges, the environmental
> conditions here in this part of the Ozarks, and the knowledge that we can
> buy good, organically grown fruit at somewhat reasonable prices.
>

Funny (and so sweet!) that you mentioned Scott's Cd. Cuts from that Cd were
played, along with a taped interview of Scott, on an internet radio station
earlier today that plays originals from lesser known musicians.

>
> As I move through geezerhoodism, I am more and more skeptical of the
> proclamations of food producers. So, yeah, I ever more prefer to grow my
> own.
>

I am still struggling with gardening. We do okay, never great. But truth
is, I'm the main (only) gardener. I get some 'help' occasionally, but
really it's just me. And I don't feel like doing it all the time, so I
guess you get what you get. My experiment (growing something new to me)
this year (thus far) is cabbage. I have 6 heads and hope that at least 3
make it. ;) I'd like to make sauerkraut in my paternal grandparents
earthenware crock (in my possession - along with Grandma's blue canning
jars!) like they did on their farm in sw IN.

Bev N. has posted some lovely recent photos of her garden produce on
Facebook. She and Ron are doing well (Ron gardens now, too).

>
> We have thus far this year gorged on strawberries, cherries, and now
> boysenberries. The blue fruit did not make it. But before I give up on
> blueberries, I solicit you advice.
>
> Our blueberries have been mulched with sawdust and/or peat moss. A few new
bushes we planted to fill in holes in a row were planted in peat moss.
They've all made it. We still have approx. 45 bushes (+ six new ones that
don't have much on them yet). We have mostly early and some mid varieties
(Patriot is one). We started picking this year on June 6--the earliest in
the dozen years we've lived here and beats last year 'early' date of June
15. We pick for a good 3+ weeks. If we mulched regularly, we'd have far
more berries than we usually get--but figure we can live with the 24 gallon
freezer bags full we picked last year (new record). This was the first year
that we did not use all of them before it was time to pick again. Also the
first year that I was not excited to get started picking. ;) We are fast
running out of freezer space and I figure I need to dry them instead. But
we use easily 75% of the berries for morning smoothies in warm months, so
dried berries wouldn't work well for that. It will all work out.

On our homestead shelf we have two books that might be helpful to you.
*Blueberry
Science* (Paul Eck) and *Blueberry Culture* (Eck and Norman Childers). We
'inherited' these with our farm when we bought the place. The sellers left
their homestead-related books when they moved. I'd be happy to try to
answer or find answers to your questions. Even better, I'd be glad to mail
one or both books to you if you're interested in them. Both are serious
reads. ;) I've glanced at them just a few times over the years and found
them helpful, can't even remember now what it was I needed to know at the
time.

I'm a big fan of bartering or trading for what you want. Everybody can't
grow everything. This much, I have learned. Of course, this implies that
you have 'extra' or 'enough' of your strawberries or cherries, or
what-have-you. ;) If you decide that you're done with blueberries or they
just don't work for you, then trading for them is a great option. If you
lived nearby Gene, I'd trade blueberries and throw in apples in September
for cherries as we don't have those and I love to make a couple of cherry
pies or cobblers in the fall. We have so much fruit and we don't have
cherries, and figure that we need those, too. I tried to trade for cherries
just a couple days ago, only the person that had too many also had 60
blueberry bushes! Oh well. I haven't given up on cherries yet.

I'd love to catch up futher but need to get going now and wanted to get
back with you.

I hope this finds you and Chris well. I bet your grandson is growing up
fast!

So great to hear from you. Glad you're still around. :)

Take care,

Lisa & Scott (who says "Tell him hello and that his comment was sweet" when
I forwarded your email to him)

--
Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough,
and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos to order, confusion to
clarity. It can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger
into a friend. Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today,
and creates a vision for tomorrow. -* *Melody
Beattie*<http://www.quoteland.com/author/Melody-Beattie-Quotes/2993/>
*




Archive powered by MHonArc 2.6.24.

Top of Page