The Spill…

I like blueberries. No, I actually love blueberries. If I were forced to have only one fruit for the duration of my life I would ‘choose the blues.’ 

Everywhere I have lived I have planted blueberry bushes, and sought out u-pick farms to satisfy my craving while waiting for my own plants to mature. That takes years. If you’re fortunate enough to move into a home with an existing mature patch, which I did many years ago when I was living in the Puget Sound area … instant delight. There among sturdy old bushes I effortlessly enjoyed handfuls of luscious fat, deeply blue berries. 

When I moved from that home I tried to replicate that healthy fruitful garden. I purchased 10 young plants from a local grower mixing it up with early season to late season bushes thinking to have many months of blueberries. I planted. I watered. I weeded. I waited. Slowly, year by year the little bushes grew new shoots raising my hopes when they finally produced a few berries. Then we made the big move from the damp coastal climate across the state to sunny, hot, dry Spokane. 

After investing years into these tender bushes I wasn’t about to leave them behind. My husband Dan and I dug each plant up and captured the massive root balls in large squares of burlap tied carefully around the base of the plants. We then hauled the 10 bundles in my Honda Element to our newly acquired rocky hillside farm. We dug a massive trench, heeled the bushes in, and carefully tucked them in with straw. I crossed my fingers and hoped they’d survive a much harsher winter only weeks away. 

It was a lot of work to move that blueberry patch, but the memory of being able to pick handfuls of berries from my own garden was still alive and well deep inside and I didn’t want to start all over again. 

In the coming spring I carefully removed each of the bushes from the trench. I planted them in 10 good sized holes dutifully lined with chicken wire to prevent ‘Death from Below,’ aka: pocket gophers. I had heard horror stories about these furry rodent devils and it didn’t take long to become acquainted with them. With their sharp little claws they tunnel undetected under your garden and kill your plants by eating the tender roots to ground level unless you install a barrier like chicken wire that they can’t chew through … I have been at war with them since we moved here 10 years ago. 

I expected that I would have to be patient for a few years for some berries. Once again I waited with little to no results, doggedly convinced that these slow growers just needed time. That didn’t stop me from thinking about what more I could do to get the berries coming. I made assumptions, and as Juan Ruiz states in The Four Agreements, “Never Make Assumptions.” Oops. 

My first assumption was that these were ‘West Coast’ varieties not able to withstand the very intense solar heat in Eastern Washington during July and August. No problem. I hung an enormous orchard shade over a cable running above the center of the patch. The long strings holding the shade taut continually got tangled up when the ‘tent’ flapped violently in the wind. Not ideal, but if it would keep the sun at bay I’d weather the mess. The bushes were growing, albeit at a snail’s pace so I didn’t give up.

My second assumption was that I knew exactly what it took to care for the bushes. I had lots of experience to draw upon and did what I had done before on the other side of the mountains. I put in drip lines and turned them on every few days like I had done for years. I fertilized, I weeded, I propped up branches with Y shaped supports carefully trimmed from tree limbs. I hung bird deterrents. I talked to them, I begged them, I pleaded for mercy. The bushes stayed alive, perhaps, however, a little spindly and still no fruit. 

At the beginning of last summer, 9 years into the project, I began to think about accepting defeat. Maybe it was time to throw up a white flag, surrender to the gods and concede that these bushes could not thrive in this climate. It was a mismatch and I needed to let go. Period. And, as chance would have it, my neighbor told me that she gets her blueberries from ’11 Acres,’ a u-pick farm in the local farming community just a 15 minute drive from our house. 

Over that summer I, along with my son and daughter went to ’11 Acres’ several times for blueberries. We ate our fill while we picked flat after flat and filled not only our bellies but our freezer as well. It was a bumper crop and it was heaven. No matter how much was picked the bushes were still loaded with berries. 

This spring while I was swirling a blueberry smoothie in the blender I got to thinking about last year’s experience at 11 Acres. First of all, their bushes were thriving in bright sun without any shade. Secondly, the long branches loaded with fruit hung at will without propping looking more like miniature weeping willows than bushes, and yet all remained intact. Thirdly, and perhaps most importantly, every time we went to ’11 Acres’ I came home with soaking wet feet. The bushes were mostly flooded with water. 

While sucking up my smoothie it dawned on me … I had been operating on assumptions; too much sun, weak branches, the varieties of bushes couldn’t produce in this climate. I was stuck in what I ‘knew’ and had been modifying solutions to the problem based on previous experience. I was blinded by what I ‘knew’ and I had almost admitted defeat. 

Right then and there I made a command decision … I threw out what I thought I knew and went with what had been right in front of my eyes while eating handfuls of berries at the u-pick.

Instead of relying on meager drips I decided to water the bushes everyday directly from the hose with as much water as the ground would absorb. I gave up the props for the branches and I let loose of the orchard shade.

Turns out that the sun wasn’t a problem or the varieties of the bushes … I hadn’t accounted for the amount of water needed to penetrate the dense mineral-strong soil in this arid climate. Adding to that, the hot dry summer winds sweep over the land acting like a dehydrator sucking moisture from tender leaves. Water, and plenty of it is the hero.

This morning I ate my fill of blueberries from my very own garden while moving the hose around to water the bushes. The branches, laden with fruit are hanging like weeping willows without breaking. The birds come and help themselves but there’s enough for all. 

Maybe it’s a fluke, just a good year perhaps, but the result is undeniable and stunning. I wonder what else I ‘know’ that just ain’t so …

“The trouble with most people isn’t that they don’t know anything, it’s that they know so many things that ain’t so.” Mark Twain