Oh my do I have battle scars from this weekends blackberry foraging. On my first hike up with the dogs on Saturday to my “spot” , low and behold there is a women picking MY berries! I was just planning on scouting how the crop was doing but luckily I had a bag and after a few polite words I started in on the harvest.
Having only shorts and flip flops on, I had to retreat and get better prepared.
After those crazy hail and thunder storms passed I went back up with the proper foraging attire on. Since she had picked all the easy ones I had to go even deeper then usual. I found some areas that seemed to be favored by some large animal, as all the foliage in front of the thicket was flattened! Hopefully Fifi the Chihuahua will always warn me if a bear is approaching. All in all I got about 7lbs of blackberried and found some new territory too. I’ve frozen the berries because I think I’ll have one more trip and then I’ll make the jam. To preserve the wild tartness I use half the amount of sugar as berries.
12 cups berries=6cups sugar.