Why I Love Blackberries

It's blackberry season again and every morning I wake up, have my coffee and go out in the yard and in just a few minutes pick a few blackberries to eat with my cereal. There is something really neat about having access to as many ripe berries as you want. They are so much better than the ones in the store and you can pick them just at the height of flavor and ripeness. I never used to like blackberries much when all I had was purchased from the store; I thought they were very expensive and not that good.

We have a small wild patch in our yard that produces tons of berries over several months. Eventually in the fall, the rainy season hits and the berries start getting moldy and aren't as good. In some years we've canned over 20 pints of blackberry preserves just from the small patch in the yard. I've also got raspberries, blueberries and bilberries that ripen over the season as well.

It is interesting having a wild section in the yard, it seems to attract a wide variety of things. Different types of plants grow in among the blackberries and there are many small frogs and other creatures.

The birds love to eat the berries too and are always perching in the branches for safety. This year there have been a bunch of these very small hopping bugs that look like little tiny grasshoppers or aphids. They don't seem to be effecting the crop much. Here's a close-up of one feeding a spider:

Some tips on picking:

Think giant tree sloth, slowly gratefully harvesting one berry at a time. If your moving too fast after playing a first person shooter all day you might be ripe for making a blood donation on the vines; it's best to have plenty of time and cooler weather. The ripe berries should fall off with practically no effort, but shouldn't be too mushy or there might be mold. Here's a bowl that we are getting ready to can – it took about an hour and a half to pick.

Problems with Blackberries

Well I have to admit that a lot of folks around here seem to consider blackberry hedges a noxious weed. A couple different neighbors offered to help poison them or cut them up. There are a few potential problems:

• Staggering around intoxicated and falling into the hedge could be painful (Not usually a problem for me though)
• Hedges are high maintenance and require frequent pruning or they top over the fence or take over the yard.
• Furry creatures, RATS love to take up residence in the hedge and eat the crop.
  

The last one is kind of the biggest issue, especially if you have a bird feeder. We've added a net to catch the seed and placed our compost in a plastic tumbler so hopefully there will be less of an issue. They can be a real problem if they start to nest in the crawlspace so you really have got to watch for this. A nice warm crawlspace is Valhalla for rats! Several generations seem to remember the experience and they will try to chew their way through the hardy plank siding trying to get back in there. Once inside they will nest and poop and pee and tear up all the insulation, bury their dead, build altars, etc. The whole thing smells like rat nest, kind of sickly, putrid and earthy. Interestingly the hedge never smells like this; I think it is because there is more natural cleansing from rainwater, less population, and increased airflow.

The builder designed the crawlspace entryway with a dirt floor that they could easily tunnel through - a couple bags or ready mix concrete fixed the issue. There was also an access tunnel several feet down that they had dug out where the crawlspace drain passed through the foundation wall that I had to seal around with concrete - so you've got to look carefully for all the access points.

If you can deal with this your good to go and those juicy blackberries will taste oh so sweetly! You may have to share a few with the wildlife, unless you can figure out a way to build a greenhouse around the hedge or something.