Blackberry picking was not as good this year as the last few years at the place in which I normally pick in Missouri. I think that it was a combination of too much wet weather and too many people finding this great location. I know for a fact that at least one church goes there to pick and that they bring dozens of pickers.
Yes, this patch is large enough to accommodate dozens of pickers. The problem is that people, including myself, will damage a lot of fruits that are not yet ready to pick. I see a nice large blackberry and try to pick it and discover that it holds to the vine so strongly that the fruit is damaged. That blackberry sets there and starts to rot, especially if the weather stays humid.
Multiply that kind of abuse by many times and you discover that half the crop is damaged and rotting. One of my problems is that the berry-picking location is a two-hour drive into Missouri for me. I am sure that it is within a half hour for most of the other pickers who can also come out to pick almost any day during the week.
One of my boys and I spent a few hours picking there recently and we got a little more than 10 pounds of fruits and that will make a little more than two gallons of blackberry wine. Normally, I can pick a bucket every hour, which is about four pounds. We spent four hours picking, so we should have had much more than 10 or 12 pounds.
I made a lot of blackberry jam from the first batch that I picked several years ago and even after giving most of it away to friends and family, I still have enough that I do not want to make any more jam. That jam is four cups of blackberries and seven cups of sugar plus a bit of pectin.
It sure is good to use just before taking a long bike ride or when I have some other extreme reason for a sugar blast, but I just do not need that much sugar too often.
On the other hand, a good dry wine is a great way to preserve this fruit and it lasts a long time in the bottle. I had my first taste of home-made wine at a company function several years ago and I was instantly hooked on the idea that anyone can make their own wine.
We are very fortunate in the Kansas City Metro area that there are several beer and wine-making stores with all of the equipment and a lot of knowledge on making beers and wine. Once you start making beer or wine, you start finding out that some of your co-workers are also doing the same. It is sort of like a secret society.
Besides making the beer and wine for your own consumption, there are also competitions in which you can participate. The competition even includes labels, so for those who think that they have a talent for label art, this is a good opportunity to show off.
I know that some are very much opposed to alcoholic drinks because they have the risk of being dangerous for those that abuse it, but the same can be said for too much salt or even too much water.
Traditionally, the purpose of alcohol was to preserve the fruit as a liquid drink. I would not drink water directly out of any stream because it may contain an assortment of pathological organisms. A good wine or beer, on the other hand, contains enough alcohol to kill most organisms and that makes the drink safer to drink than wild water.
Apples were raised primarily for either hard apple cider, which has enough alcohol to be similar to beer, or for apple wine. Just two centuries ago, apple wine was the drink of choice in America simply because it was safer to drink that water from a stream where the cows were standing.
Next year I hope to find a new location that is not heavily abused by other berry pickers because I would like to make more than two or three gallons of blackberry wine.
Matt Nowak lives in Lansing and works as a natural resources manager.
