Tuesday, September 1, 2009

High-Bush Cranberries




Viburnum edule


not a true cranberry, but from the honeysuckle family
The fruit not very abundant here, compared to the coast.


But an abundance of color for sure.

The weather is just gorgeous here the last few days. I set out to pick more berries, they make a wonderful 'old moccasin' jam. But... somehow i kept walking. Through this magical forest. In the green picture you see elfin creek shimmering below.
I came by elfin falls, which was just a spout running among the green moss, a drop only of about 3 feet. But some years the creek even runs dry this time of year.
I came upon wet pools with big Coltsfoot leaves growing.
i walked all the way to the beginning, Now is that called the mouth? where it flows out of Moose Skull lake. The lake still abandoned, no water bird in sight.
Luckily the forest surrounding has lots of twittering friends in it and i scared a Nighthawk sitting on the ground.

6 comments:

Cicero Sings said...

I have found only a couple of these bushes here ... in a damper spot where there must be some underground water. Our area is too arid.

Janet said...

Jozien, how do you make 'old moccasin' jam? I have never heard the term before.

jozien said...

Hi Cicero, Our area mayby similar, it's only at this creek that i can find bushes with berries in my neck of the woods.
Janet, i always refered to the taste of this jam as 'old socks' an accuired taste. Virginia used the phrase; old moccasins. Which i thought more appropriate.
I boil the berries strain them, to get the big seeds out, and make it into jam. try it!

Meandering Michael said...

Hi Jozien,

If you wait until we've had a couple of deep frosts before you pick the berries, they'll be sweeter and will make a nicer (less stinky) jelly.

Ah, the smell of stinky socks - a sure sign of autumn!

christopher said...

:) Love the pictures.

Anonymous said...

Moose Skull Lake - now that's poetry!