{"id":12749,"date":"2023-08-06T12:49:59","date_gmt":"2023-08-06T19:49:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.gemtactics.net\/wordpress\/?p=12749"},"modified":"2023-08-08T04:09:09","modified_gmt":"2023-08-08T11:09:09","slug":"a-walk-in-the-blueberry-barrens","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.gemtactics.net\/wordpress\/2023\/08\/a-walk-in-the-blueberry-barrens\/","title":{"rendered":"A walk in the blueberry barrens"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

On Sunday. I spent a good long time almost alone in this huge field under this very blue sky. Picking blueberries, and then taking a walk. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I’ve walked this road before. I forget where it comes out though. I didn’t get that far this time. It was hot (relatively), windy, and I was worn out by picking berries in the sun. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Panorama <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

You know it is a rough road when you have to ford a stream in your vehicle. It was shallow enough at this point in the summer for me to cross on the right side by stepping very mindfully in certain dryish places on the stone. The coloration in the stream must be from tannin of some kind from somewhere upstream. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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A stream crosses the road<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

There are so many berries. This field is privately owned by someone, I don’t know who. The berries were harvested in past years when we first started coming up here. But it hasn’t been harvested commercially for a few years now. And not sprayed either. So people come by and pick. But most of the berries go back to the ground if they are not eaten by some creatures. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Blueberries and fern<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

When a field is commercially harvested there usually comes a time when they clear the rocks out to allow machinery to come in and pick, rather than migrant workers – or t<\/a>ribal nations people<\/a>, like the Passamaquoddy who pick traditionally. Here the large boulders are moved into a line at the side of the road. But the field is still full of medium and small boulders, so it could not be harvested commercially at this point. And the removal of the large boulders has left deep holes and pits in the field. You have to watch your footing. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Boulders along road<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

There’s a fake moose sculpture in the field. It is probably as close as most people will get to seeing a moose in this area. From a distance, it really does give the impression of a moose. It’s been there since I’ve been coming to this field and has been reconstructed numberless times. I decided to go up close to take a good look. It has tennis balls hanging in a strategic place on the underside. Someone has a sense of humor. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Fake moose<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Fake moose\u2019s face<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

I looked up “blueberry barrens” to see if it was a real designation or just something people say. It is a real designation – “These barrens are wide, flat to hummocky expanses of dwarf shrub vegetation punctuated by sparse pine or spruce trees. Lowbush and\/or velvet-leaf blueberry is the predominant shrub, forming a fairly even carpet.” <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Blueberry barren<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On Sunday. I spent a good long time almost alone in this huge field under this very blue sky. Picking blueberries, and then taking a walk. I’ve walked this road before. I forget where...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":12745,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12749","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-walking"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gemtactics.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12749","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gemtactics.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gemtactics.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gemtactics.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gemtactics.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12749"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.gemtactics.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12749\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12754,"href":"https:\/\/www.gemtactics.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12749\/revisions\/12754"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gemtactics.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12745"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gemtactics.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12749"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gemtactics.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12749"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gemtactics.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12749"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}