A rite of summer

Before they closed for public picking, we made at least one trip each summer to Spall's Blueberries to fill a few containers with one of the best fruits on the planet (and one of the few fruits from the Americas to make it big). When we had visitors last weekend, we decided we needed to introduce them to the joys of blueberry picking, so we headed up to the DeMotte-Wheatfield area where there still are half a dozen blueberry patches open to the public.

The berries do not all mature at the same time, so every few days people can pick the bushes again. The drawback of the uneven maturing is that machines are less useful in harvesting than they would be if the berries all matured simultaneously.

 We had three young helpers. The oldest says she does not like blueberries but she was a good picker. The middle one probably picked more than she ate. The youngest decided the best way to get blueberries was to eat those already picked and in our storage containers. He had to be watched carefully.

The blueberry farm provided the coffee cans that you can wear around your neck. I recall that back when we went to Spalls, the coffee cans were metal. Has it been that long?

Hidden in some of the rows were irrigation nozzles. I suspect they were as much to protect against last spring frosts as to protect against drought.

U-pick berries were $1.70 per pound in most or all of the DeMotte farms. There is one place near Lake Village that was advertizing berries for $1.00 per pound. You should be able to pick for at least two or three more weeks. If you have never picked blueberries, you really should experience it.