Swamp land, Big Lake: Picked ripe red currants. Enough are red now to be worth it! Many are still green or just about ripe.
May 17
Fairbanks: Official Chena Ridge greenup day.
October 18
Swamp land, Big Lake: Picked quite a few lowbush cranberries in dry meadow areas. People are picking crabapples in Anchorage and other areas.
October 4
Swamp land, Big Lake: Probably the last time I’m going to pick a bunch of red currants this year. I still can’t resist the perfectly good racemes, but some clusters are getting brown or slimy so they’re all about done.
September 30
Little Susitna River, Houston: Picked lots of lowbush cranberries.
August 19
Little Susitna River, Houston: Lowbush cranberries are quite red with some white unripe blotches remaining on undersides; most berries crunchy. A few plants are still flowering. Everything is looking good for picking later. Very impressive bunchberries this year, good snacks. Also snacked on nice timberberries and found a few trailing currants for snacks, too soft to keep.
August 17
Swamp land, Big Lake: Picked lots of perfect early blueberries in select spots.
August 16
Matanuska River Park, Palmer: Highbush cranberries are cherry red and good to snack on; tart. Serviceberries are nice and ripe or past their prime (shriveled). Soapberries are ripe. There are still watermelon berries to snack on.
August 5
Swamp land, Big Lake: Tried to pick every kind of berry around. Picked tons of wild raspberries. Also picked quite a few red currants and very ripe watermelon berries (almost too squishy to get.) Picked many perfect trailing black currants from one spot. Picked a few ripe crowberries, cloudberries, and rosehips here and there. Snacked on ripe timberberries. Lowbush cranberries are large and green and highbush are turning red. Huge, interesting mushrooms are everywhere as well as a ton of mourning cloak caterpillars in feeding frenzies.
July 31
Woods, Big Lake: picked lots of raspberries and some bog blueberries. Lots of good watermelon berries around and pretty good bunchberries too.