We picked her up down at son, Bill’s on Thursday and drove on home after a nice visit there. She’s not a dog/cat person, so we all had to do some adjusting, including the animals, but it’s working out fine. Monique likes picking fruit, so when she saw our Evans Bali cherry trees, still loaded with cherries, she grabbed an ice cream pail and went to picking. She quickly picked half a pail full. Then I pitted them and put together a fresh cherry pie. Luckily, son, David and his family were here for a visit also, so we got to eat a fresh, hot, cherry pie with whipped cream on top to cool it down a bit. Yum!
Monique has never been this far north in Minnesota, as our farm used to be 100 miles south, so I’ve spent a few days driving her around to see the sights. We drove along the Echo Trail, which is as close to the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness as you can get in a motorized vehicle. (All motors are forbidden in the BWCA. Most folks travel via canoe.) We stopped at several beautiful lakes. Then we drove a little north and went to the Vermilion Falls, where the Vermilion River crashes down a set of waterfalls, then through a deep, narrow gorge of rock.
Sunday, we drove north again, to Orr and west, to the Vince Shute Bear Sanctuary, where we got to see dozens of wild, unfenced black bears. Often pretty up-close. One yearling climbed a tree and settled down to sleep with his paws crossed and a smile on his face. He was only about 20 feet away! (Yes, we were on the observation deck and perfectly safe.)
Yesterday, we tucked in all the tomatoes again while Will was cultivating between the rows of beans, in the Wolf Garden. Monique is a hard worker! When we got home, she grabbed an ice cream pail and went to the berry patch and picked half a pail of raspberries. Gee, I guess I’ll have to make Will’s favorite cheesecake so they can go on the top. Of course, we’ll also eat a bunch right out of the bucket! — Jackie
we tried netting our cherry tree, but getting it on and off was a PAIN! I finally bought a huge roll of 20 foot wide superlightweight white garden cloth, we roll off two 30′ pieces and “sew” them together to get a (roughly) 30′ by 40′ piece. then we put this over the tree like you would with netting. works like a charm! we undo it enough to pick a bunch, close it up again, – do this a couple or three times till we take it off for good and let the wildlife clean up the tree.
I also prune it into a weeping shape so we can reach the fruit, and also it is easier to net.
The tree looks like a huge marshmellow in our yard… but we get cherries!
Sandy in NM
It seems like every climate has some things that do better than others. For instance, I’d give a lot to harvest peaches. But, alas, that doesn’t happen in Zone 3. I’ve tried several years, with the hardiest varieties, even bringing dwarf trees in, in tubs, during the winter. No dice. Oh well, we have to be grateful for what we have.
How wonderful to have your daughter come in for a visit! Sounds like it was a great time for all of you!
I’m sorry for all the others in flooded Vermont. I went through massive floods in Texas a couple of times and it’s awful.
We’ve got red currants on our property and some type of raspberry – I think. Both have a fungus, I don’t know yet what to do for them yet.
Does anyone know what to do bunches of baby cotton wood trees. We cut them down but they still come back. I think I will have to dig them out. They are everywhere here, including where my first garden will be.
I agree; floods are horrible and I feel so bad for folks affected. With seedling cottonwoods, the best bet is to dig/pull them out as soon as you see them. You can get radical and spray them with Roundup or Tordon but I prefer hand pulling to chemicals if you can do that.
So glad to see you having some fun and enjoying family! It is always a blessing when our children who live away come to visit and it just seems there is never enough time with them. It sure looks beautiful there. We are still incredibly dry while to the south of us they are getting an abundance of rain. My heart goes out to the Vermonters who have suffered floods and destruction. That cherry pie looks absolutely delicious!! Prayers for a safe and healthy week.
Thanks so much Marilyn. The weather this year is so crazy, nearly everywhere, with floods, tornadoes, drought and high winds. I, for one, would like to see it all even out!
What a special post!
I’m so glad you have been spending time sight seeing with family. Those photos are awesome.
I’m envious the birds don’t strip your tree while your cherries are small, hard, green things! We didn’t get ONE cherry!
Year before last we spent two days netting the huge cherry tree and were able to pick cherries. It is just too big of a job to net…sadly, I don’t think we’ll get to eat any.
I know what you mean. The birds eat all of our elderberries while they are still green. But thankfully, they haven’t really bothered the cherries much. I think it’s because we have so much ripe wild fruit like pincherries, juneberries and chokecherries, ripe at the same time as our pie cherries.
My green elderberries are disappearing too. Time for bird netting I guess.
Family to visit is the best!
Our berries, straw-, rasp-, and black-, survived the great flood of last week here in Vermont. We are lucky to live on one of the ‘higher elevations’; it means the snow lingers longer in the spring, but all our rain goes downhill away from us. All in all we got 7″ on July 10 according to the rain gauge in the pasture which makes for almost a foot of rain so far in July and the month is barely half over. Amazingly I haven’t seen much rot out in the garden, perhaps because we opted for raised beds and they drain a little better. Towns just north and south of us really got badly flooded, buildings are gone, parts of roads are missing, mud everywhere. In some ways this time was worse than Hurricane Irene in 2011.
Wow, that’s too bad! The weather has been SO crazy this year everywhere! I’m glad you’re doing well.
Wonderful news of family fun
Having some Raspberry envy here
In Kansas. Yes, I have raspberries,
But they don’t do nearly so well as
Back home in North Dakota
Sounds like so much fun!! Hope I can meet her on Friday.
Comments are closed.