No time to write. Too busy fending off a sore throat, dodging raindrops, fixing supports, getting in those last few plants, weeding, etc. before the papers come in and grades are due. Enjoy this photo of my currant bush. I do wonder why one bush is full of berries, and the other (about 3-4 feet away) doesn’t have any. Weren’t they the same cultivar? They don’t look alike. Uh oh.
But I won’t complain.
Neither will I complain about this, my pretty, the first crop of the year. The haskap berries are ripening! Not sure why I shot the only berry that was damaged, but you get the picture. Pretty soon I will have enough to make jam, hopefully before I leave.
The ripe berries look like elongated blueberries and taste tart and sweet, like a cross between a cranberry and a raspberry, or maybe a slightly unripe loganberry.
I managed to withhold buying blueberries (yet again) and some rather promising, if not exactly upright as advertised, huckleberries.
My tayberries are also yearning to break free; I actually have berries the size of my pinky tip. They might be even earlier than the black caps.
Can’t wait for jam season, for summer to be here. Enough with this rain, already!
30 May 2011 at 5:02 pm
I’ve dealt with horrendous sawfly larvae infestations on my ribes (both Imperial White Currant and 2 varieties of gooseberries). Last year they were completely defoliated before I figured it out. This time I’m hand picking the caterpillar-like creatures and feeding them to the chickens.
30 May 2011 at 6:57 pm
All the sawflys must be at your house. Usually they are at mine. This year, none on any ribes: an ornamental currant and three gooseberries. I tried the hand picking of the worms but that’s a lot of picking. I finally gave in a sprayed around the base of the plant early. Hate to do that but otherwise, what? Funny that the berries make even with no leaves and the plant comes back the next year.