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Your Fruit Connection
If you would like to be added to our email list please contact us . Typically the newsletter will be short and come out weekly during the harvest season [June to August] to let you what is happening. It also comes out once or twice in off season.
Neptune Grapes & Muscadines Begin We will start picking the NEPTUNE GRAPES Wednesday 8/18. There are still MARS SEEDLESS GRAPES but you have to walk all the way to the back of the field (where you turn to come in our driveway). These grapes are delicious! The Venus and Jupiter are gone. Picking time per gallon of BLUEBERRIES continues to increase. There are still some- mainly in the Tif and Powderblue, but they are in pockets, and you have to scout for them. Recent rains(1 inch 8/12, 0.25 inch 8/14, and 1/2 inch 8/15) after 25 days of drought, helped, but came a little too late. FIGS have slowed up. There are still figs... just not as much volume as earlier. So the early birds are getting the figs. The MUSCADINES came along quickly in the bronze types... especially "Early Fry" – and those picking conditions are already very good. The black and red muscadines are still not ready.
HOW TO PICK A MUSCADINE GRAPE -
From the north? Have fond memories of cherry pie? Well "when in Rome do as the Romans" ... the southern equivalent of cherry pie is hull (muscadine) pie. Check the recipe at our web site. We made some great Muscadine Juice last year from both the bronze and the black muscadines. At Thanksgiving dinner and Christmas dinner our extended family went wild over it. We used a steam juicer we got from Lehman's Supply, www.lehmans.com . They have 2 models $70 and $190. We got the $70 version and made about 15 gallons that we drank fresh and froze a bunch for the winter. The JACQUES GRAPES are ready! These seeded grapes are only $1.25 per pound. They are great for juice, jams and jellies, pie and wine. This is a dark blue-black grape that has a good strong flavor. PEACHES: Wed 8/18 and Thursday 8/19 will be the last delivery of peaches. Sweet Sue is the variety, and just like it sounds, it is a very sweet peach. Like other red skin peaches, it is not only a tasty treat, it is great for freezing and for cooking.
THANKS TO ALL OF YOU FOR YOUR ENTHUSIASM AND SUPPORT!
GRAPES GRAPES GRAPES (& Figs)
GRAPES
Neptune grapes are a white grape- and although they LOOK ready- they look like the grapes you see in the store- do NOT pick the white grapes yet! Rumor has it, that if you pick the white grapes, they will take them away from you at the porch- you can’t take them home! (We can’t have you eating bitter grapes, now, can we?) FIGS HAVE STARTED
PEACHES
CORN this year will go through the 1st of August or so. In case you didn’t realize, we have been able to offer some amount of corn from Crystal River Farm (in the upper part of the county). Just like with peaches, if you are making a special trip, be sure to call first, in case we have already sold out. IT IS STILL PEAK OF BLUEBERRY SEASON. There are still some BLACKBERRIES- but you have to look down and inside of the bush. MISCELLANEOUS: Don’t forget your buckets if you have them! And we could use a little rain dance. Any showers that come through the area seem to just pass us by. THANKS TO ALL OF YOU FOR YOUR ENTHUSIASM AND SUPPORT!
BLUEBERRIES still at PEAK OF SEASON!
We will start picking Venus Grapes Tuesday July 20.
Picking grapes is a little trickier than picking blueberries!
In addition to the mechanics of picking, knowing when grapes are ripe is also trickier than with blueberries. Clusters on the vine do not necessarily ripen at the same time. Please inspect the cluster before cutting, to be sure it is uniformly very dark blue. If the cluster of grapes is uniformly dark blue the grapes will be sweet. A reddish cast or even just single red berry or two in the cluster, and the grapes will be tart. Our grape fields are small so you may have to come back to try again. Any questions, please ask the staff on the front porch. Saturday we plan to start the Jupiter variety. It is also dark blue, seedless, slip skin, sweet, aromatic grape that is also high in nutriceuticals. Blackberries
The blueberries are dripping from the bush…literally! The best way to pick them is to use a small container, which you stick in the bush with one hand under the cluster of berries and tickle the ripe ones off. If you have to tug they are not ready yet. Figs should start about July 30, give or take a day or so, and muscadines in late August.
We look forward to seeing you in the field!
BLUEBERRIES at PEAK OF SEASON!
Peak of Season in the Blueberries!!
Blackberries are slowing up some. Good picking in the morning but with heavy picking pressure it is fair picking in the afternoon. We are picking Navaho and Chester along with Chickasaw at this time. The Chester have a lot of Red berries with king berry turning black. The Chester picks over a long period so got to see past the red and get the black. Some of the sweetest blackberries are down, in and under.
REMEMBER- PLEASE DON’T PICK THE GRAPES.
The figs should start by the first of August if not a day or two before. The muscadines are beginning to show in the field so if you are out that way check them out.
Thank you ALL! We wouldn’t be here without you.
BLUEBERRIES coming to a CRESCENDO!
BLUEBERRIES with a crescendo!
COUPON:
GRAPES:
Not everyone gets our newsletter so if you see folks looking at the grapes with an eye to harvesting them please help us educate them. STILL OODLES AND OODLES OF BLACKBERRIES! FIGS forecasted to begin August 1, and MUSCADINES should start the last week in August.
PEACHES:
THANK YOU FOR YOUR SUPPORT!
BLACKBERRIES - BLUEBERRIES - & PEACHES
BLACKBERRIES are GOING GANGBUSTERS!
BLUEBERRIES ARE IN!
PEACHES Begin Today - June 15
Market Schedule
What a great beginning to the season! See you on the farm!!
Blackberries ARE IN!
We will be at the Pickens market on Wed Jun 3. From our Happy Berry Newsletter May 21, 2010, we are keeping with our
Beginning Harvest Forecast: for the blueberries and rest. We are projecting at the 70% confidence interval for the specific dates and 95% confidence interval for within 3 days the following harvest dates:
Strawberries are winding down for the season.
We are looking forward to a fabulous summer!
Blackberries June 5-7
No Strawberries at The Happy Berry
Happy Berry Newsletter May 21, 2010
Beginning Harvest Forecast:
Weather factor: The winter of 2009-10 was a perfect winter with good chilling hour accumulation (over 1100 hours) with no extremes cold nights with temperature in the single digits, hence no cold injury. It has been a cool spring with not a single frost at The Happy Berry. We have had excellent pollination weather with an excellent population of blueberry bees. We are also proud to say that we have some very large colonies of blueberry bees that we noted while mowing, which bodes well for next year. We are experiencing excellent rainfall with 1 inch or more per week. We will Open June 5 with limited blackberries and eggs. We will be giving tours of the farm for the benefit of Carolina Farm Stewardship Association (CFSA) On June 5 and 6 from 1 to 6 PM each day. So load up the car, van or bus with all the folks you can carry. The price is $10 per vehicle if you do just our farm (or any one, single farm. The price is $30 for all 20 farms or $25 if you pre purchase your button. Tickets can be purchased at the door at any of participating farms, Whole Foods Market, Happy Cow Creamery, Split Creek Farm, at www.carolinafarmstewards.org or call CFSA at 919 542 2402. Free tickets are available to volunteers who assist with registering and greeting visitors. Email Kelly Gilkerson at kgilker@clemson.edu to volunteer. You can link to a Google tour map at Carolina farmStewards.org to plan your day. It’s a great way to get know your local farmers. News: The weather factor we discussed above has resulted in an excellent crop and all the bushes are hanging heavy with berries. I have never seen blueberries as big they are now, a month before the first possible harvest. The Choctaw, Chickasaw, Kiowa, Navaho and Chester Blackberries look excellent. We already have blackberries that are over an inch in length but still very green. We have removed all the Prime Jim and Prime Jan blackberries. They just did not perform as we had hoped as an early crop or as a late crop. The late crop had small berries that dribbled along at the poor picking level. Our conclusion is that these two varieties are just not well adapted to our area. Dr. Clark, the breeder, says there are better blackberry varieties coming. We have planted Natchez, a new, recently released thornless variety of blackberry. We are removing any fruit that might occur this year so you won’t get to taste it till next year. Natchez is supposed to be an early variety about 5 to 7 days after Choctaw. Choctaw continues to perform after 15 years in the field despite several minor problems where other varieties like Apache and Triple Crown that collapsed from virus disease after 3 to 4 years in the field. We have high hopes for Natchez. We have started the process of transitioning the blueberries last year and continuing this year from older varieties to newer using varieties like OnSlow, Ira and Robeson. Older varieties are susceptible to late season leaf disease, which results in fewer flowers the following spring. We anticipate the process will take 7 or more years. We have started using blue tubes on new young plants to keep rabbits from eating them and the plants love it. Why the rabbits eat new baby plants when there are ample new sprouts from older plants we do not understand. While picking please be careful of the blue tubes. The response to the seedless table grapes has been fabulous! We have added more of the Jupiter variety to our daughter Zoë’s front yard. We first saw fruit done this way in the Okanagan Valley in British Columbia. It was beautiful. It is also in keeping with our philosophy that the home is supposed to be a place of production not just consumerism. We are excited about using clovers as a substitute for nitrogen fertilizer. Crimson clover is working very well in the seedless table grapes and muscadines for the past three years. Our first try with a more acid tolerant type of winter annual white clover in the blueberries failed. We followed up by very carefully liming to raise the soil pH to 5.5 (less acidic) and replanted again with “Ball Clover.” It worked! So now the plan is to do all the Blueberries. Another characteristic of the new varieties we are transitioning to, Robeson, Premier, Ira and OnSlow is their tolerance to higher soil pH, as much as 6 or even a little higher. We have eliminated the use of pre-emergent herbicides (weed Killers) 4 years ago at The Happy Berry, which has made possible the use of clovers. Prices will be the same as last year.
See you in the field!
Blackberries June 5-7
No Strawberries at The Happy Berry
We don’t do strawberries BUT-- Strawberry season is here. Local growers advise that even though they have not had to frost protect it has been a cool winter and spring. The cool weather means the berries are slow to ripen, but our strawberry-farmer friends tell us that with a few warm sunny days and the strawberries will ripen quickly now.
Some local stawberry growers:
Hardy Berry farm (www.hardyberryfarm.com) is located on 232 Strawberry Road off of Dobbins Bridge Road 4 miles west of Anderson. Kevin says he will open on Saturday April 24 but says volume will be limited the first couple of day. He expects to reach full volume by Tuesday or Wednesday. They are open 8a to 8p each day. They are also into fresh flour and several other berries including blue and blackberries like us. Their number is 864 224 5441. Beechwood farm is located 204 Bates Bridge Road near Slater/Marietta SC. There phone is 864 836 6075. They said that they are open now but anticipate supply to be limited initially. They say there will be tons in just a few warm days. Like us at The Happy Berry they only take cash (so no credit cards), thanks. Happy Cow [330 Mckelvey Road, Pelzer, SC] will have strawberries this year. They are growing organically but Tom points out that they are not certified organic because of the cost of the certification. He tells us that they have not had anything put on them, not even organic plant pharmaceuticals. They use lots of cow manure and it is a plastic culture system. If you headed south on route 25 from Ware Place go 1.9 miles to the second left. That is Mckelvey Road and they will be one mile on the right. Stawberries will be available every other day, pre-picked only, until aprox May 1. By then they anticipate being open every day and open for pick-your-own. Regular hours are Mon-Fri 9a to 7p, and Sat 9a-5p. Call 864 243 9699 for more information. Callaham Orchards is located off highway 20 in the Cheddar community just outside of Belton SC. If you get to Winston you have gone to far. They will be open Tuesday, Thursday and Saturdays with a limited supply.They will be open from 9 AM to 6 PM. The strawberry tours are totally booked but other tours like blackberries and peaches are still open. They will start Blackberries and peaches in June. Phone is 864 338 0810, web site www.carolinapeaches.com, email callahamorchards@charter.net Rose Hill Plantation will not have strawberries this year. They will have vegetables and cut flowers. Call first 864 306 0303. They also have a very interesting store on site and carry things like Happy Cow milk. They are located on Three Bridges Road, Easley SC. They have been picking for quite a while since they are in a greenhouse. At The Happy Berry we are forecasting blackberries to start about June 5 to 7 and blueberries to start about June 17 to 20. The Happy Berry eggs are available at “Amazing Savings” Main Street in Six Mile SC. We are very appreciative of all the nice rain… lets hope it keeps up. We have not needed to use the wind machine a single night this year. The crimson clover is in bloom… it is quite a sight to see! We are forecasting a great- no, a fantastic!- crop of blueberries this year! On behalf of all of us local farmers…we appreciate your support! Come see us! Anytime!
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