Wild Black Raspberries....rubus occidentalis

A few of the places we've lived have been in rural locations.  Sometimes we've been luck enough to spy the telltale red spikey canes of raspberries!  We cultivate these canes and low and behold, they take over.  We allow these tangles to grow and flourish because we know how awesome the black raspberry is.  It may look like we're the sort of neighbours who let our property go wild.  That just may be the case!  What may look like an unruly yard to some, our boys look at it like its a veritable grocery store.  Case in point, the picture below!



Looks wild...but its really yummy.

 Turns out these yummy wild treats are actually called wild black raspberries or rubus occidentalis by their proper name.  I've included some info that I borrowed from Wikipedia:

Rubus occidentalis is a species of Rubus native to eastern North America. Its common name black raspberry is shared with the closely related western American species Rubus leucodermis. Other names occasionally used include wild black raspberry, black caps, black cap raspberry, thimbleberry,^[1][2] and scotch cap.^[3]
Rubus occidentalis is a deciduous shrub growing to 2–3 m tall, with prickly shoots. The leaves are pinnate, with five leaflets on leaves strong-growing stems in their first year, and three leaflets on leaves on flowering branchlets. The flowers are distinct in having long, slender sepals 6–8 mm long, more than twice as long as the petals. The round-shaped fruit is a 12–15 mm diameter aggregation of drupelets; it is edible, and has a high content of anthocyanins and ellagic acid.^[4][5]
Black raspberries are high in anthocyanins. This has led to their being very useful as natural dyes and, since anthocyanins are powerful antioxidants, to a great deal of interest in them for their potential nutraceutical value. Extensive work has been ongoing at Ohio State University to evaluate their benefit for cancer treatment in mammalian test systems,^[6] and the first clinical trials on patients with esophageal cancer.^{[7]
(source:  Wikipedia, Rubus Occidentalis)}

A closer view of the wild black raspberry...the trick is to wait until they turn black, as their name suggests.  The red one are too tough and they don't "fall" off the cane very easily.  You know you have a ripe berry when you touch it and it basically falls into your palm.  Our neighbourly birds do love them too, but thankfully the canes are thorny, so the birds don't get out of control like they do with our poor strawberries.  They neighbourhood animals appreciate our wild yards...even if our neighbours don't.  Tee hee!



I send the boys out with baskets in the mornings and they pick (and eat) until they are full...then we throw them into pancakes or muffins.  They keep their shape better than commercial raspberries or traditional raspberries.  They are smaller, tougher and sweeter, I find.

If you let enough of the canes take hold, you'll have plenty of berries for freezing, eating and cooking with.  I had some this morning with yoghurt, flax seeds, raw almonds and honey.  YUM!  Since we've identified these wild berries, I can't help but see these canes everywhere!  I spotted some in the back of the parking lot in an industrial area of Kingston, I've seen them all over. 

Look for red canes with small thorns.  They almost look like dogwood, but dogwood has a slightly different colour of red and no spikes. 

Strawberries!

Its a little bit late, but strawberry season is upon us (although I think its just about done at this point...in our area anyway) 

Our strawberry plants took 3 years to make a decent crop.  Growing strawberries is definitely a labour of love and an act of patience.  I was hoping it would be worth it in the long run, but like anything in the garden, you never know how its going to turn out.  This year seemed to be a jackpot, so I decided to forgo the annual strawberry picking trip and try our hand at home harvesting our load of freezer jam.  Its one of our favorite fishing trip snacks as well as a bedtime snack (PB&J sandwiches) so we go through a lot of it!

In previous years, we have gone to two different pick your own places in our area.  Both were 20 min drive away, so I felt good about not using any fossil fuels to get to our berries for a change.  Fruition Berry Farm off of Hwy 15 and Paulridge Berry Farm north of Napanee on Palace rd are both great places.  The kids have enjoyed both farms for picking.  The one thing I'll say is that Paulridge had a lovely shaded area for the kids to play in...which was a welcome site after a couple of hours in the field under a burning hot sun.  Paulridge is typically not open on Sundays...so that's when we opted for Fruition.  The best part about Fruition is they have THE best teenagers working there.  Helpful, polite and eager...which is a great thing when you have a crazy moment of thinking you can pick berries with a 2 yr old in a stroller...by yourself!  (I clearly didn't think that one through)  Both places run about $8.50 per big white basket.  You can bring your own containers and they weigh them on site.  We purchased the big white baskets years ago...for a whole $0.50 a basket.  It added a bit to the price of our berries, but we've used them every year AND we use them in our garden too.  A good investment indeed! 
 

We picked our first batch and ate most of them, throwing some into pancakes to start.  By the second and third pickings, we had enough to make jam.

Crushed berries (1 3/4 cups worth in a liquid measuring cup), 3 cups of white sugar (I cut down the recipe from 4 cups, as our berries were small and super sweet), 2 tbps lemon juice and one packet of Certo.  Its the fabulous no cook recipe!  Stir the sugar and berries and let stand for 5 minutes.  Stir in the rest of the ingredients and let set for 10 min.  

 

Fill plastic containers so that there is about 1 inch left before the lid.  Let stand (covered) on a countertop for 24 hrs.

Freeze in the freezer! 

That's it!  That was all there is to it!!!  We ended up with 6 plastic containers in the freezer, 4 strawberry and 2 strawberry rhubarb.  Now the next sweet berry will be the raspberry.  Blue berries follow shortly after that.  We aren't in a good part of Ontario for peaches or cherries...but one can still hope. 

I have several strawberry recipes that I want to test out this year, but I may have to resort to local picked berries.  Our patch seems to have stopped producing for this year anyway. 

I was so excited to plant strawberries 3 years ago, that I had no idea there were types of strawberries.  I had no idea there was a variety called the ever-bearing strawberry.  Now that I know, I will pass along this piece of advise.  RESEARCH before you do anything...as our plants are now so established...it would be a shame to dig them all up now.  However, the idea of having strawberries for longer than the month of June is almost to much to bear!

Now all that's left to do in our strawberry patch is to keep on top of the runners, which will continue to try and make new strawberry plants until the fall comes.  Its quite a bit of work, but, like I said, its a labour of love.

Are you making any preserves with the sweetness of Ontario summer?  Tell me about it!

Perennials...the easy way to garden!

The wonderful thing about owning land is that you can finally get started on those plants that take a long time to establish.  You have time on YOUR side!  I love the idea that you can plant some things, virtually forget about them and they'll keep on giving you wonderful gifts EVERY YEAR!

I thought I would dedicate this post to the plants and things that you can purchase now, plant and enjoy for years to come.  Now since I've already discussed asparagus so far, I will avoid them for right now.  Just note that asparagus also falls into the "easy garden" category. 



My neighbour's apple tree in full bloom!

APPLE TREES:

I have been reading Suzanna Moody's sister's book "The Canadian Settler's Guide" by Catherine Parr-Traill.  There is a whole chapter on how the apple tree or orchard can add so much to the home.  Back in the 1830's they dried their apples and rehydrated them for use all winter long...that was....as long as the mice didn't find them first.  Poor Suzanna's neighbour dried out her apples but when she went to collect them the neighbour only gave her 3 bits of dried apple...saying the mice found them under their bed and ate a feast.  (Under a bed???  Surely the rafters would have been a better place in those days!)  Apples store well over the early months of the winter.  They also freeze well for later use.  I was so intrigued with the dehydrating idea, that we may be looking for a dehydrator come this fall. 

There is a great debate over whether or not you must spray for bugs with apple trees.  My mother in law swears by the stickey cup method to attract bugs away from the precious fruit.  Plant an apple tree and let me know how that turns out.  For now we are happy to pick our neighbour's tree (with her permission) and seek out the local U-pick farms.  Its a GREAT family activity.



10 plants turned into THIS...



Strawberries in bloom May 20-2011



 STRAWBERRIES:

Strawberries are wonderful to have at home.  They take a whole season of care for only a few weeks of fruit.  Nothing in the world beats going out to your patch in the morning to grab some fresh berries to add to pancakes or just to sprinkle on cereals or yoghurt.  We planted 10 plants a few years ago and they EXPLODED!  Its been quite a challenge to keep the plants from taking over our parking lot!  (top pic you can see the bumper of my car)  The runners are a naturally produced survival technique.  Each plant may produce an infinite amount of runners per season.  Our first year we let the runners go wild....the second year we picked any runners we saw.  You can never get all of them, but it definitely helps the plants produce more fruit than plant.  All of its energy is spent on fruit production rather than making a bigger, greener plant.  Last year, the berries came way too early and the rains kept us inside most of the time.  The robins were thrilled....they got most of the berries before we had a chance to pick them.  That's nature for you! 

Originally this bed held flowers of all types, but we aren't flower people, so we dug them all up and decided what we were going to put in the bed.  We chose a perennial for the bed, as its very tough to turn that soil in the walled in space in the front yard.  Its also impossible to get a tiller in there.  We picked strawberries for that bed because strawberries like a slightly acidic soil.  We were able to cover the soil with cedar chips without fear the acidity would affect other growing things nearby (its just berries there!) 



Owen poses with the wild black raspberries we trained across our fence

  RASPBERRIES:

When we first moved into our home, we noticed a corner of the parking lot that had wild black raspberry canes peaking out from around the fence.  We decided to let them flourish!  By keeping other plants and vines at bay, the canes are able to take as much sun and rain as it likes.  After the first year, the canes were starting to bow towards our cars!  Thats when we started training them down our fence (using gloves of course....ouch!)  Raspberry canes are quick thorny...so take care.  Luckily you won't have to fuss with the canes much.  They do their own things and by mid june we'll have scads of berries!  We usually freeze some and pick and eat the rest fresh.  They are certainly longer lasting than the strawberry counter-parts.  We can pick raspberries for almost 2 months before the August heat does the poor guys in. 

I absolutely adore it when we send out the boys with a basket each and they pick their own....still in pj's.


Our disappointing blueberries

BLUEBERRIES:

We had another awkward area for planting.  We had tried lettuce and herbs in the area previously...but the big manitoba maple blocks out a substantial amount of sun throughout the day.  I grabbed about 6 blueberry shrubs and only 4 survived.  The are still only twigs after 3 years.  I feel like there is something we are missing when it comes to this patch as well as blueberries in general.  We treated the soil with natural cedar chips as well.  Blueberries love the acidic addition to the soil.  So far they have only produced a few flowers each and the robins nab the berries before we've been able to taste a single one. 

Our experience with blueberries has been disappointing at best, but my husband is still optimistic.  Me?  I'm getting tired of weeding the area without any return.  (I'd love to dig them up and relocae them to someone else's property, personally!)  Our sad experiences with blueberries makes me jealous of those who live in the hwy 7/Kaladar area...they seem to be sitting on a gold mine of blueberries!



Garlic Chives



CHIVES:

It doesn't matter the type of chives you grow...they all rock!  A baked potato is nothing without these green lovelies.  We FOUND them growing in the area that is now our flat bed garden, now tranplanted beside our BBQ right out the door from our kitchen!  Snip as you need them, they grow back bigger and better all season long.  Snip, wash and chop.  Add to a freezer bag and you have chives all winter long.  You can dry them too, but the frozen kind always taste more fresh.  

We have continued to cultivate garlic chives.  They are a broader leaf variety and sound snooty.  Not just chives, but garlic chives.     



Rhubarb is getting bigger!



RHUBARB:

I'll be doing another rhubarb post shortly...ours is getting out of control!  Rhubarb also freezes well, since when you cook with it, it turns to mush anyway.  Freeze them chopped or whole, both are just as easy to cook with.  They are a great source of vitamin C and other anti-oxidants.  Not a fan of the taste?  Add white sugar and try not to love them. 

All of the above-listed plants and trees are a great way to get into gardening.  There is very little expense put into them and they last for many years.  Talk about getting the most bang for your buck!

Have you got perennial plants in your garden plan?

Asparagus...the dream of owning land!

Once my husband and I started gardening, there was no going back.  We tilled and worked each and every place we rented.  We grew everything we could with the exception of the odd veggie that was known as a perennial.  For those who don't know, perennials are plants that come back every year.  Asparagus is one of those plants.  You have to plant it and then demonstrate extreme patience as you wait until its third year before you can really harvest them.  As we never knew when we would have to move from our rentals...we never bothered to start them.  Instead we coveted those who had glorious big bushes of asparagus growing on their property.

Then the day came when we signed our names on the dotted line....a MORTGAGE!  Now there's an experience that is truly sobering.  Nothing makes you feel so adult than saying you are in debt to the bank for the next 40 years. 

On a positive note, we had ourselves a property that we could call our own.  Our darling neighbours June and Ron Goodberry traded with us some seedling asparagus in exchange for some purple tulips left by our predecessors.  We felt like we got the better end of the deal, since we feel if it doesn't feed us, we aren't excited about growing it. 

Our asparagus has grown so much in the last few years....I believe this season will be its 4th year in our soil.  We really dropped the ball last year, letting too many of the stalks go to seed.  This year we are determined!  Pick and be eaten we say!!!  Not only are they delicious, asparagus is incredibly healthy for you.  High in vitamins A, C, K, and B complex.  They contain trytophan and minerals such as manganese, cooper, phosphorous, potassum, iron, zinc, calcium and magnesium!  Its also a diuretic...so be warned!    

I have to say I do chuckle when I see asparagus in the grocery store and the price tag attached to them most of the year....seriously?  I will admit I do get a hankering for them at some points during the winter....but I refuse to buy them....because they are FREE in my backyard...if I'm only patient.

If you do decide to grow asparagus, make sure to do some looking around first.  They will be there for a long time and they do grow big!  I was amazed when I saw how bushy they can become if left to go to seed.  Make sure they won't be in a location where they will block out the sunlight for your other veggies. 

On a side note, we seriously need to weed out our asparagus patch...they do not like competing plants in their space.  And we also did some spring pre-treating of the area.  We added some of that composted manure we bought last fall (when they were on sale) right on top of where we knew they would poke up their little crowns.  They love the nitrogen boost!