North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

["William C. Garthright" <billg@inebraska.com>]

> They are WAY to big to net, whereas it appears that most of the gooseberries 
> are small enough there is some possibility of keeping the birds off them.


For what it's worth, birds haven't bothered my gooseberries* (they do go 
after the currants, though - and pretty much everything else I grow). 
Certainly, if you have cherries ripening at the same time, I wouldn't 
think they'd even notice the gooseberries (although using sweet cherries 
to decoy birds away from gooseberries seems a little odd to me - heh, heh).

And yes, the gooseberries are earlier than most of my fruit - especially 
if I pick them green for pie. I don't make pie, but I can usually talk 
my Mom into doing it for me. Note that we tried ripe - or mostly ripe - 
gooseberries in pie this summer, too. They were great. I don't know if I 
like green or ripe gooseberries better in pie, since they're both good, 
and I didn't eat them side by side. But the color of ripe gooseberry pie 
was very nice.

But I planted gooseberries for fresh eating, and they've been a bit 
disappointing for that. But I can eat them in oatmeal for breakfast. And 
I did discover that combining them with blueberries was wonderful 
(either in oatmeal, or just in a bowl with milk and sugar), so maybe 
I'll have to start growing them, too. :-)

Bill
Lincoln, NE (zone 5)

*PS. When I was researching this stuff, I read that birds will eat the 
buds from gooseberries, very early in the spring when they're still 
dormant. I don't remember where I read that, but they recommended 
waiting to prune gooseberries until after the leaves had started to 
open, just for that reason. I haven't worried about it, because I 
haven't noticed birds on my gooseberries at any time of the year, but 
maybe they just haven't figured this out yet.

--
From fanaticism to barbarism is only one step. - Denis Diderot