A Berry Picking Primer

When I was a kid I spent a lot of time during the summers picking berries. My parents have a house on a mountain called Blue Hills which was named for the multitudes of blueberries that grew there. We took day trips up the slopes of the ski runs at Mont Avila because there were even more blueberries there. We picked strawberries, raspberries, blackberries and of course blue berries which we learned to recognize by the little crowns. The other berries that were blue were poison, or so my brother told me and I was never brave enough to try for myself. Berry picking was a great way to keep us busy. We would get lost in the bush for hours, spurred on by the promise of pies if we brought back enough fruit. It was also a superb way of getting us to be quiet on long walks, as my mother had us convinced that if we were quiet enough we could hear the strawberries growing. Eventually we wised up, but not until my mother had got a lot of quiet mileage out of it. Somehow it never worked on my kids.

The best part was that I was the absolute best berry picker of all my friends and brothers. This was in part due to my being a ridiculously picky eater who could not stand eating berries. I just picked them. Because I was not spending half my time eating my stock, I picked a lot more. And because I did not eat half my stock, I came home with a lot of berries. I also had more time and patience to figure out how to find the best and the ripest berries, as well as the spots where there were the most berries in the bush. It also helps that I am short, significantly shorter than both my brothers, and therefore much better positioned to find the good berries which are only visible from under the bush.

I have not spent much time over the past few years contemplating berry picking. I still engage in it when visiting friends and family in the country, and of course in my strawberry patch which up to this year has been the only berry patch in my daily life. The past few weeks, however, now that I am spending up to two hours per week harvesting tomatoes I have been thinking about it quite a bit.

You may be wondering why I am thinking about berries while picking tomatoes. Tomatoes are, technically, a fruit. In fact, to quote my rabbi, the difference between wisdom and knowledge can be defined as follows: it takes knowledge to know that a tomato is a fruit, but wisdom to know that it should not be added to a fruit salad. Not only is a tomato a fruit, but it has the same growth pattern as berries. The best and the ripest fruit are inevitably low and deep in the bush. They are also inevitably surrounded by biting insects. I have discovered this summer that the bigger the berry, the bigger the biting insect. Strawberries are swarming with some kind of noseums that leave tiny itchy bites. My tomatoes are swarming with large ravenous mosquitoes that always bite my upper arms just as I am reaching far into the most unreachable depths of the tomato jungle. I have no idea what the official definition of a berry is, but if it is a fruit that grows on a bush near the ground, it seems to me that the same principles apply.

I also realized that I am still better at finding and picking the good ones than anyone else in my family. I send out Josh or one of the kids to check for any ripe tomatoes and after they come out empty handed, I go out and find 25 ready to pick. So I decided to share my methodology.

The author of the book The Fruit Hunters, Adam Gollner, describes how humans are one of the rare species that can visually differentiate between green and red, a trait which is very beneficial when searching for ripe red fruits in a green jungle. He even suggests that stop for red and go on green relates to an instinct to keep going through the green leaves until you spot the red fruit and stop to eat. Although this does not explain our tastes for kiwis, bananas, green grapes and avocados, it is an interesting theory which I contemplated as I hunted in my tomato patch for the slightest hint of red. The theory is appealing, although I have no idea where he got it from. So the first key to berry picking is to duck low and look for red (or blue, or black as the case may be).

The second part of the technique is to lift up the branches and look underneath. The good stuff likes to hide in the leaves. Also, no matter how frequently you pick, there are always a few that stay hidden in some corner and eventually you find them perfectly ripe and ready to go just when you thought all the good ones were gone.

That is it. Go low, look for red, and lift the branches. It takes time and practice. It takes focus, concentration, and a meditative obsession which is why I love to clear my head after a long day of work and hide from my children under the shade of a jungle bush, and feel completely primitive. I have picked over one hundred tomatoes in the past three days. It really works.

Seeds

We have a friend who has an incredible green thumb. I remember twenty years ago, Claude walked into my apartment, looked at my plants and explained to me that what I thought were fruit flies were something called fungus gnats. He also taught me how to get rid of them and save my plants from death by using diatomaceous earth. For those of you who are not acquainted with this wondrous stuff, it is a powder made of fossilized plankton, which is harmless to mammals but lethal to insects, as the sharp, jagged edges of the dust gets into their exoskeletons and tears them apart. It is great for getting rid of cockroaches, for example, or pests in house plants. Though non-toxic, it is too effective a pesticide to use in the garden, where it would destroy bees and other beneficial insects along with pests.

Claude has since channeled his love of growing plants into a career as an agronomist. He is the guy who farmers and industrial growers consult to solve problems. He does not do a lot of garden consultations for hobbyists like us, but in exchange for a home cooked meal and an afternoon of hanging out with our family, we got some free and valuable advice.

I wanted to know why my lettuce was too small, how to make my broccoli flowers grow big and dense, what plants should grow together and which shouldn't, and how do we decide where to rotate plants from year to year to prevent depletion of the soil. Claude looked at my tomatoes and announced that we had a bacterial infection. It was obvious to his practiced eye when he saw dark spots on the tomatoes, and a lot of the lower leaves were getting yellow. I just thought it was because it was fall. And there had not been spots on the tomatoes I had picked prior to that day. Lo and behold, the next ones starting to ripen had dark speckles on them. Claude told us that this particular bacteria were airborne, and by using a sprinkler to water our plants, we dropped the bacteria right onto them. Also, the wet leaves helped it to spread. He highly recommended watering our plants at ground level and not wetting the leaves. He also told us that once the bacteria was on the plants, it would be on the seeds as well, and would appear on the next generation of plants. His recommendation was to dip all seeds in hydrogen peroxide before planting them. In answer to my specific questions, he suggested that we have a soil analysis done next spring. It costs $30 and can provide us with very concrete recommendations as to how to improve our garden.

Claude's recommendation about the hydrogen peroxide was probably the most timely advice he could have given us, because right now, my life has become focused on seeds. I am saving, drying, packing and labeling all kinds of seeds for next year. Of course, some come from my own garden such as the cucumbers. Others are from things we would like to grow, such as that great Korean melon we bought at the local oriental grocery store.

I have been walking and biking around my neighbourhood on seed missions. I took my youngest daughter Orianne, who has recently mastered her bicycle, on a bike tour of the alleyways of our neighbourhood. The alleys are great because you have a view of everyone's backyard and gardens, and inevitably there are flowers growing against the fence and dropping their seeds on the pavement. What a loss! That is where I come in, rescuing all kinds of interesting cultivars at the limits of their yards. Orianne, while helping me pick dried seeds from four or five different varieties of pink morning glories, asked me if I was stealing. I told her that if I walked onto someone's lawn and dug plants up from their garden without asking, that would be stealing. Seeds are a different category, especially if they are growing over the sidewalk or on the other side of the fence from their garden of origin. I am careful never to walk onto someone's property, I only harvest what sticks out onto public grounds. Some of the beautiful dark pink cosmos I raided for seeds were growing on a square in the middle of the sidewalk.

We went away this weekend, and spent time with another friend who is a superb gardener. We had visited Alex a few years back when he was working on his PhD in philosophy, his thesis describing his experience of being self sufficient, living a minimalist life. He had built his home from recycled materials, provided his own energy using a combination of solar power and a windmill, had the first composting toilet I had ever seen, and an unbelievable vegetable garden boasting the largest imaginable produce: huge lettuces, pumpkins, and squashes. He has subsequently graduated, married and moved into a charming but more conventional house. He has been there for a year or so, and the vegetable garden is just getting started. Alex is particularly interested in heritage plants and unusual cultivars. He is growing, among other things, tomatoes which are green when ripe, some Kong sunflowers which are huge and produce tasty, purple shelled seeds. I came home today with some sweet red pepper seeds, some Kong seeds, some (highly toxic) castor beans (I had never seen castor plants before and fell in love). I also have finally obtained a clump of the elusive red day lilies I have been seeking. I hope they are red. They are no longer blooming and Elyse, Alex's wife, was pretty sure those were the red ones. I also came home with a clump of lilies with lovely small purple flowers, and a few wild gentians which I am trying out on the side of the house.

I am still trying to guard the few giant striped sunflower heads remaining in my garden. The squirrels are bold and the heavy flowers keep drooping down into their range. I have decided not to grow them along the fence next year. Despite my frequent spraying with coyote piss (which is running low), the little beasts keep running along the fence and whittle away at the edges of my last remaining flower in the back yard. I call my technique "pissing them off" but it is a constant effort. I have tied all the flowers in the front lawn to stakes to support them and dowsed their stems in piss. I may yet have sunflower seeds this fall.

One last update on the slugs. Things improved for a few weeks, but we had some rain and the slugs seemed to be coming out in numbers again. I have spread Slug-b-gone everywhere again, and today I did not see any when I harvested my tomatoes but there is still evidence of their appetite. Next year I will start earlier.

RECIPES

Sorry to be a tease, but I am posting a list of the things we have done with our harvest. When I have the time, I will add recipes, but by then I may lose track and forget some of the good stuff. Here goes:

Pesto genovese
Nut pesto
Dried tomatoes
Salsa
Sunflower seeds
Wild and wonderful salad
Broccoli and bean stir fry
Josh's pasta sauce
Apple cider
Peary (pear cider)
Stuffed squash
Mint lemonade
Moroccan mint tea
Strawberry cheesecake
Lentil squash dahl
Squash soup
Cucumber and tomato salad

Why garden?

Today friends of mine who have been following my blog came over to see my garden. It was fun to show them around, and their 8 year old son had fun harvesting anything he could find that was ripe. They took home green beans, tomatoes and a hot pepper. Caryn, his mother, asked me how much does it take for a garden to break even. I asked what she meant. "When what you save on groceries breaks even with what you spend on the garden."

This is an interesting question. At the beginning of the summer, I was thinking much the same way. I have been known to track costs with an accountants fastidiousness, but for the garden, I have not been tracking. This is partially because I got the sense early this summer that I would have to look at the cost over a long-term period. Now we are buying lots of black earth, but over time our hay and compost will enrich the garden and we will make our own earth for a lot less money. I would have to amortize the costs of fencing and patio stones, chicken wire, perennials, rental of equipment and so on. By mid-summer, the weekly cost of beer was easily balancing out my savings on produce. Thanks to Slug b gone, I have dropped my grocery bills again. The depanneur staff must think I am a recovering alcoholic. Once harvest time started, the idea of cost having anything to do with gardening disappeared completely. The garden seems to be able to offer benefits which are impossible to measure in dollars.

The garden is the ultimate urbanite experience in grounding. It literally pulls you down to the earth and connects you back with your roots. There is a thrill in climbing through the jungle of tomatoes to find the ripe red treasures hidden in the bush, discovering the mantis hiding perfectly camouflaged among the green beans, finding a patch of wild strawberries popping up from a cinder block. There is a profound satisfaction in running outside barefoot in pajamas to pick beans, cucumbers, basil and green onions to make a salad for lunch. Everything tastes better than store bought, even better than produce from the farmer's market. Leftovers from a salad made from lettuce, cucumber, wood sorrel, orpine and lamb's quarters stayed completely fresh and crisp for more than a week, even after it was washed and cut. Yesterday I made a salad from store bought boston lettuce purchased a week previous, and the lettuce was half-rotted before I took it from the bag. I have become acutely aware of how long the produce in the store must be, how much more like cardboard. The garden food is tastier, crisper, fresher, and you have more choice of variety than you do at the supermarket. I have never seen San Marzano tomatoes or Japanese cucumbers in stores. We have alpine strawberries which are smaller and sweeter than what the stores offer. I am growing 9 varieties of peppers, 3 types of beans. We are collecting seeds for all kinds of interesting plants for next year, including Korean melons (crisp and sweet), and chocolate tomatoes (named for colour, not flavour). I know what I am growing, and I know what I am eating: it is all organic, my pest control is organic and eco friendly unless you are a slug.

Can I put a price tag on what I have learned in one single summer? On the opportunities for bonding and sharing with friends and neighbours that my garden has provided? On the fun I have had, the exercise, the relaxation, the meditation and the fabulous meals built around my harvests? I think I have more than broken even.

A special thanks this week to my mom, who delivered the promised poppies. They are planted among my blooming sunflowers. And to Chloe, my mother-in-law, who sent a bag full of day lily rhyzomes. I need to think about what to do with them before planting. And to my partner in gardening, Iulia, who bought a bag of tulip bulbs and is sharing them with me. I find myself already planning out for next year. I think I am hooked.

Production time

As I write this,  there are tomatoes gently drying in my oven. My freezer is overflowing with pureed tomatoes and pesto. My counters are covered in tomatoes waiting to be processed. I have a line of butternut squashes on my kitchen counter. There are three huge carboys of pressed fresh apple juice brewing into cider (we cheated and bought apples at the market, our tree is too young to produce yet). I plan to call my mother to ask for use of her basement freezer to take the next batches of pureed tomatoes. Tonight we dined with friends on pasta with pesto made from our own basil, a big cucumber and tomato salad, broccoli and three types of beans (green, yellow and green with red speckles) all grown in my garden. My house smells good.

I just came home from a wonderful weekend out of town visiting with some old friends. Anita is a veteran gardener who has designed and worked on her own garden for years, and has adorned it with her own copper sculptures, a fountain, paths and a bench. She keeps rainbarrels and uses their water for her garden, never the hose. She has impressed others in her neighbourhood and been engaged to design their gardens. She has stringent expectations of any plant in her garden. It must survive without needing more water than what the rainbarrels can provide. She will not allow anything that spreads too much and roots too deeply. She has her own brand of botanical Darwinism. She described lots of interesting plants which I have never heard of and of course cannot remember the names of (I asked her to e-mail them to me along with the name of the product she puts in her rainbarrels to prevent mosquitoes from breeding). She will only plant flowers given to her from friends' and neighbours' gardens, no shopping. I have not seen her garden in a few years, as she lives in Newmarket and I don't get out that way often but I am tempted to visit next summer.

We were both staying with mutual friends, Paul and Barb, in the beautiful home they bought last year. Prior to our arriving, they spent a lot of time this summer renovating, repairing and landscaping. They have a small flower garden out front. It was fun to be consulted on some garden design ideas. The only crops they have this year are apples (super delicious! They are not sure of the variety but they were really good), and crab apples. They have devised an interesting way of dealing with the fallen crab apples to prevent a pile of rotten goo. They rake them in a pile and  vacuum them up in their shop vac. Paul confided to me that Barb has discovered  if she puts the hose over her shoulder while vacuuming, the crab apples give her a noisy but effective massage. I will keep that in mind once my trees produce more than the current two or three fruits.

Inevitably, upon returning home, after a hasty hug to my husband and children, I spent an hour harvesting for dinner and the tomato assembly line. The tomato, squash and bean plants are still flowering, and the basil is regrowing for a third time. I also noticed that some of my spring flowers are starting to bloom again along with my sunflowers. The coyote piss has done wonders, and now that the squirrels are not decapitating them, my remaining sunflowers look gorgeous. I took photos and will get to posting them soon.

On a different note, I am reading a book lent to us by my mother-in-law called The Fruit Hunters by Adam Leith Gollner, which I am finding delightful, entertaining and informative. I am reading a chapter that outlines the horrors of the huge international agricultural industries, nothing I am unaware of but seeing it all compiled together is nightmarish. He touches on the power of pesticide companies and questions how much we should trust the assertions that foods/chemicals etc. are as safe as claimed. I am thinking of doing more research on the miraculous Slug b gone, which seems too good to be true. I am still spotting the odd slug, but no question the numbers have dropped. 


Anyone interested in Josh's recipes for pesto, tomato sauce, cider, etc, let me know in the comments!