Where I Can Gather Cranberries in Washington State
Inside the Washington Cranberry Bog
Posted Along November 4, 2019
"Go forwards, eat one!" Jessika, part time cranberry farmer, full time not-for-profit leader, bucked up Maine to pop a ripe cranberry in my mouth. Just eating a plain cranberry off a vine in a Washington cranberry bog is something I ne'er considered in front. Until recently, my cognition of cranberries scarce extended on the far side the cheerful bright berry prepackaged in plastic and headed right for my Deepfreeze to wait for an evening or weekend of inspiration for holiday treats (like cranberry sirup leading to cranberry cocktails).
I'm a city dweller who spends a lot of time outside and cares about my intellectual nourishment. I make an effort to eat local nutrient that's in season. Still, I find very separated from the story of my food, where IT comes from, who grows it, how information technology grows. As I learn about Washington's crops and food network, I'll continue to share it hither. So far, I've enlightened most asparagus and peaches, and there will be Sir Thomas More local foods coming! Nowadays we're diving into Washington's cranberries, that cheerful, colorful berry loaded with anti-oxidants and vitamins, just in time for the holidays! The Long Beach Peninsula Visitor's Bureau hosted us for a recent visit, all the same all opinions are my own.
Washington D.C. is the 5th largest producer of cranberries in the US, and cranberries are native to Washington submit where they enjoy bogs and marshes. They have been cultivated on the Long Beach Peninsula and other parts of south Washington since the late 19th century. Cranberry farming has historically been a challenging dress; traditionally they are eaten only around overwinter holidays, especially Thanksgiving. To boot, cultivating cranberries requires careful management of pests, weeds and rime which has been fine-adjusted for generations.
The traditional, larger cranberry farms are all set forth of the Sea Spray Carbon monoxide gas-op, which developed the cranberry juice cocktail to increase the market for cranberries away from vacation meals exclusively in the 1930s. Today, most of the cranberries consumed in the U.S. are in the variant of juices or dried, although the berry itself and the cranberry jelly (you know, the one that's round and has rings from the toilet!) are heavily consumed the week of Thanksgiving!
What happens in a Washington Cranberry Bog?
At forward, when you approach a Washington cranberry bog, it doesn't look similar much (unless it's the day of harvest home and it's inundated, then it's super colorful and dramatic). Information technology looks like a somewhat lower area of vines with weeds here and there. It has a reddish soupco just isn't exactly red. When you get up close to it, however, the smart red berries first to pop out betwixt the vines and at one time you see them you see them everywhere! This is a place where you give to look closely at the details so you don't miss information technology. This is what the bogs look same most of the time.
Cranberry vines hug dru dormant for the winter, then blossom in the recoil and grow their bright cherry-red berries over the summer. By fall, they are fit to harvest! When we visited Washington D.C.'s largest cranberry farm, they were opening their 7 weeks of harvesting to each one bog. Some bogs are harvested using the alcoholic method (which good means they are picked similar to other berries), but many are harvested using the wet method, which you might have seen in an Sea Atomiser commercial or in other pictures of cranberry bogs. We were lucky enough to get to experience the harvest time of a cranberry bog from start to finish!
The first step in the wet method is to flood the peat bog. This happens the night in front the bog down is to be harvested and generally the water in the bog is about 18 inches deep. The next step is for the beater (a type of tractor specifically for cranberry harvesting) passed through the bog and big paddles "beat" the berries polish off the vines, which causes them to float dormie to the surface of the water. Cranberrries and their vines posterior stand up to this treatment, making it easier to harvest in one case the beating is done.
Then, the elevator gets fired up and moves the berries up to represent loaded onto the trucks to go to market.
While this was going on at one of the large, conventional farms, we had the opportunity to visit a teentsy, organic cranberry farm surrounded by native pollinating plants. We got to meet Jessika, who encouraged us to sample the berries. She farms this minor farm with her partner and his parents. When they took over this small grow in 2010, they were told by other cranberry farmers that constituent cranberry land rightful wasn't possible. Not ones to dorsum down from a gainsay, and consecrate to constitutive agricultural methods and connection to the land, Jessika and Jared did information technology anyway. Organic cranberry land is really hard because it has all the challenges mentioned above, without the use of traditional farming practices so much as pesticide qualification it even more hard.
Pests and weeds are a bigger problem which therefore make their yield per acre much smaller than it is connected conventional farms. Their delectable organic berries aren't available to buy in by themselves, to get your hands on them, you'll have to try one of the other businesses they sell too, like the absolutely incredible Cranberry Liqueur (seriously this is so, so good). If you force out't piddle IT to Long Beach to buy some at Adrift Distillers, you john too get it at Tote up Wine and More locations about Western Washington! They also keep going different farmers WHO are working towards becoming organic in Washington and Oregon.
This vacation season you'll recognize more about the news report of these bright berries and where they come from!
Hi! I'm Jennie. I'm a fourthly generation Seattleite World Health Organization lived in Alaska for 7 geezerhood. I've been a tour guide in some Alaska and President Washington and I love to ploughshare the places I enjoy with visitors, newcomers and my fellow locals. I'm so glad to take you along on the journey to experience your best low key adventure in Washington, Alaska and Western Canada!
Where I Can Gather Cranberries in Washington State
Source: https://www.ordinary-adventures.com/2019/11/inside-the-washington-cranberry-bog/
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