Wild Blackberries are among the first crop of the season around here and this morning, while I was walking a live-trap far from the barn to release the overnight catch of a single tiny field-mouse, I noticed a couple of big fat black berries hugging the ground.
It's still a little early, maybe another couple weeks for a proper harvest, but when you have a visitor that has to head back to (To paraphrase another blogger out here.) the tropics of Michigan in a couple days, you take what you can when you can.
I will now keep an eye out for wild blackberries but will need a few more weeks. Things are just starting to bloom here. Maybe this summer I can exchange pulling weeds by hand (won't happen this summer) for searching for and picking wild blackberries.
ReplyDeleteMy advice; opt for the berry picking. It's a lot more fun and tastes better too. (Though dandelion greens aren't bad either.)
DeleteDespite, or maybe because of, my Midwest upraising (Which in my day meant trimming the grass around the edges with overgrown scissors, one blister-raising snip at a time, because apparently your neighbors are going to judge your character based on the grooming of your yard.) weed pulling, by hand or otherwise, is something that's never, never ever, on my to-do list anymore. I've convinced myself that every precious 'weed' is just another part of a gloriously diverse eco-system and I'm damaging my back, hands, eyes; and the world; by pulling them.
I could be wrong about that, but I'm sticking to it anyway. . .
I imagine you must have some pretty productive berry patches around up there, maybe not always easy to get to, but the eatin's so good it's worth it.
You know you might have a point about those weeds. I could be dangerous, knowing just one driver out of a million that pass the house every day, could see me in the act and bring a lawsuit against me for destructing part of that eco-system. I like the idea of eating berries more than pulling weeds. Yes ... I remember those overgrown scissors because it was my main job, determining how much driving time I had available with the car.
DeleteThere are many and with the house next door still empty and still for sale ... those berries are all mine now. :)