For the birds

Monday, May 28th, 2012 10:16 pm
threemeninaboat: (chef)
[personal profile] threemeninaboat
I was out watering the yard yesterday and heard the birds making noises I hadn't heard before. "What in the hell are they talking about?" I thought. I went to over to that corner of my yard and found that my Red Mulberry tree had fruited. It has been a few years since it has fruited so I was pretty excited. Mulberries are awesome. I ate a few fistfulls and went to find [livejournal.com profile] randomdreams. We filled the bowl with enough to make pancakes the next morning. Today we went out and ate some more. Should be a few days left.
Mulberries are medium sized trees and we only get the low fruit, the birds get the rest.
The green fruits are reputedly hallucinogenic, but I haven't tried.

Urban foraging is one of my favorite hobbies. The Floral Shop at the end of the block has 2 cherry trees LOADED with sour cherries. Part of one of the trees hangs over the church property. We knocked on the florist's door to ask permission to pick the cherries but they weren't in so we just picked cherries from the church side. We pulled about 3lbs off and didn't even make a dent.
It took me about an episode of RadioLab (Guts) to pit all the cherries, they are cooking down now into jam which we will have with fresh goat cheese and warm bread for a midnight snack.

P1011541

Date: 2012-05-29 04:39 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] zyzyly.livejournal.com
They look so delicious!

I seem to recall that they give birds a buzz.

Date: 2012-05-29 04:56 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] manintheboat.livejournal.com
From what I can tell the birds are only eating the ripe fruits. Their droppings are all over the place and are dark purple. There were also no birds on the tree down the block that isn't ripe yet.
But birds are pretty tiny so it might take much less for them.

They were talking like my tree was the best thing on the block.

New York has lots of mulberry trees…

Date: 2012-05-29 12:03 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] franklanguage.livejournal.com
so thanks for the tip; I'll keep my eyes out.

A couple in Harlem I know have a garden (http://www.projectharmonynyc.org/) with lots of fruit trees, and they string nets to catch the mulberries that fall.

Guess I have to visit them this week, because they must be full into mulberry season.

Date: 2012-05-29 03:36 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] crossfire.livejournal.com
I love mulberries.

Date: 2012-05-30 01:53 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] okterok.livejournal.com
Hell yea that sounds delicious!

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