FORAGING REPORT

A bumper crop of wintergreen berries!

   It has been a good year here for most berries and apparently the wintergreen thought it was a good year too. Most years I see one or two berries on a few plants but a small patch along the side of our trail really went at it this year. We actually picked a pint of berries from a area about 5ft. by 30ft. Every where else I looked it was the normal one or two berries.
   Our big find on the foraging front this week was burr oak acorns. We found one big old tree at a county park that had dropped enough acorns to literally cover the ground. We picked two grocery bags full for a total of 38 pounds. We intended to go back the next day but we didn't make it. These acorns are very good, not bitter at all. We were munching on them as we picked. Since we don't have a nut sheller we hand cut each one into halves and then remove the nut meat to dry. It's not the fastest way to do it but we got the job done. It was cold a couple days after that so we were able to get them dry with the our wood cook stove. They smell so good when they are drying. They are slightly bitter now that they are dried down totally so we will leach them once or twice.
    We did find some hazel nuts still on the bush last week also. After getting them out of the husk we have about five quarts. I love them in wild rice with cranberries and maple syrup.NOM NOM! We picked lots of them earlier this year but most have been wormy when we opened them : ( . Still hope some of them will be alright.