Most blueberries, wild or tame, will be ready to pick in late July or early August. Berry picking can be done in a pioneer way or a more convenient way these days. If picking the ‘old fashioned’ way you can find wild blueberries near exposed rocks, Jack Pine trees, lightly shaded sunlight, under ferns and burned areas. Or, blueberry picking can be done conveniently at a Blueberry Farm.
In my family, the pioneer way of picking blueberries was done by my grandmother and her girls (there are 4). My Aunty Harriet relayed a few stories of the ‘picking days’ to me this morning. My grandmother (who still fishes, but has hung up her blueberry pail), would start out the adventure by making each of the girls a blueberry bucket. She would re-purpose a vegetable can, drilling holes on each side, to thread wire through to make a handle. Each child would be required to fill the can. All pickers then got packed into the car to head toward abandoned logging sites. Once there, all would get placed in their own patch to fill their can. In order to fill her ‘bucket’ faster, my Aunty Harriet started at a young age to cover leaves at the bottom of her can with blueberries. Grandma of course caught onto this and soon would not allow anyone to pour their can contents into her bucket. My grandmother was so skilled at Blueberry harvesting that she knew how to detect a bear by smell. If there was evidence of the intruder, the location was changed quickly. Because of this, Grandma and crew ran into an occasional moose and very few bears.
After the mission was accomplished, the berries were transported home and cleaned. This was done using a cookie sheet lined with a terry cloth dish towel. The debris would stick to the towel and the berries would roll into a stainless steel bowl. The result was plenty of pies and sauces at Grandma and Grandpa’s house growing up. And, for me, I wish I had been born just a few years earlier.
