North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

[list@ginda.us]

On Jul 16, 2006, at 9:06 AM, road's end farm wrote:

On Jul 15, 2006, at 9:55 AM, list@ginda.us wrote:

Basically, the only reason raspberries are expensive is  

that they don't ship well.  It's a cheap local crop.

You've never picked them in commercial quantities, I assume. Much of the cost is in the picking.

They need to be picked every couple of days; even if the weather is so wet that the berries are already moldy and will just need to be tossed; otherwise the moldy ones may infect the others. They need to be marketed with similar frequency, since they don't store for very long. So they're actually pretty time consuming for the grower. For the home gardener, of course, picking them is part of the pleasure; so the time spent is rarely noted.

-- Rivka; Finger Lakes NY, Zone 5 mostly

Fresh-market organic produce, small scale

Good point - and the motive for moving my asparagus is that it makes picking the raspberries difficult and uncomfortable on that side.  But as you say, picking enough to eat now is basically pleasurable, and they are a great backyard crop.

I have a question, how far "away" do you throw moldy berries?  I usually pick them and toss them into the nearby shrubs (5'-10' from the raspberries), but I've been wondering if I ought to move them farther from the berry bushes.

Thanks,

Ginda