Backup blackberries
For the second time since
we moved to the farm, all of our cultivated blackberries died to the
ground over the winter. The bushes quickly sent up new stalks in
the spring, but since most brambles fruit on last year's growth, that
meant no blackberries for us this year.
Or maybe not. I was
thrilled to see that a wild blackberry plant Mark accidentally left in
the gully last year is loaded with big, tart fruits. Blackberries
spring up in our area anywhere there's light and not too much
disturbance (aka mowing), and I picked lots of these wild blackberries
when I was a kid. As an adult, I prefer to spend a bit more effort
tending cultivated varieties since the plants are thornless, the fruits
are bigger and sweeter, and they're handily located right outside my
door. But it sure is nice to have backup blackberries when our
thornless plants fail!
We don't use most of our
58-acre farm for anything, but at times like this, I appreciate the way
nature fills in the gaps. And, speaking of nature, dozens of these
tiny green frogs hopped out of our sky pond this week. Even
though they're green, I'm 99% sure these are baby gray tree frogs, who will resemble their name better in a few weeks. Go find a tree, little frog!
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About us: Anna Hess and Mark Hamilton spent over a decade living self-sufficiently in the mountains of Virginia before moving north to start over from scratch in the foothills of Ohio. They've experimented with permaculture, no-till gardening, trailersteading, home-based microbusinesses and much more, writing about their adventures in both blogs and books.
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