Jump, Jive and Wail.

Here is a picture of the blackberries we have fermenting right now. Not too many people had blackberries for sale this year. I think with the frost and now all this dry weather, this isn't too good of a growing year for most things in Missouri. These blackberries sure are beautiful though, and their perfume radiates the air around them. When you stir them, or punch them down, a pink foam forms and bubbles up and looks like sherbet.

Harvest is soon approaching. We are greasing the harvestor today and I am furiously taking berry samples, mainly the Vignoles right now. I think we will be harvesting early this year, with the small crop and draught. The wildlife are in full force, birds, turkies, squirrels (who knew squirrels ate grapes?) We have caught (and released far far away from us) 3 raccoons. Raccoons can eat a lot in one night. The scarecrows are in effect also, and they make me jump when I 4-wheel past them. Then again, I'm jumpy. The amount of crop that we have lost already in the Vignoles to wildlife makes me very sad. There needs to be a better solution. Maybe we need our border collies out there all night to howl at the moon and anything else that crosses their path.