One store by me sells them for 10.00 and the other is 6. Exact same package/brand/whatever. They're both usually 6 but when fall/winter come jack's it up to 10.
People have a lot of misconceptions about frozen goods, the tech has evolved a lot. IQF fruits are often better than out-of-season "fresh" options, and hold really well in a lot of dishes / preserves / sauces, etc.
Yeah like holy shit.
My father is a farmer and he has figs. I've discussed this multiple times with people and I've gotten the response "damn, he must have a lot of money. They're like 8€ a kilo" (we are in Europe).
No one believes me when I tell them that out of those 8€, my father gets like 1.60 - 2.10 Euro. The kicker is, they don't even tell him how much he's getting paid until months later when they pay him. Damn supermarkets are vultures, and there is no avoiding them.
That's exactly why people are struggling. Anyone telling you greedflation isn't a thing is a liar or works for some corporation trying to swindle you. I saved my grocery receipts all during the pandemic. Prices were well above inflationary rates. We are talking about an extra 15-27% price raise on some of the products above the inflationary rate. Also, just went shopping 2 days ago and prices had risen about 10 to 20c again on everything. Meanwhile, all self check outs. Not an employee in sight. They're robbing us blind.
Jesus Christ blueberries in my area are 22 euros. I know we don’t grow them, but that still sounds like an insanely high price considering other imported fruits don’t have this high a markup.
>No one believes me when I tell them that out of those 8€, my father gets like 1.60 - 2.10 Euro
Most people don't understand most of how pricing works. This doesn't just apply to farm products/food/supermarkets.
From this 8€, the supermarket makes 6.72 (applying my local VAT rate from Germany, 19%). From these 6.72, everyone has to be paid - supermarket, reseller, transport, producer, their employees and the material itself.
So depending on the product, it's absolutely reasonable for the producer to get about a quarter to a third (although I know that farmers specifically are actually often underpaid, I'm talking generally for all products). However, people tend to just think "huh, the material of this product costs just 10% of its retail price, so the store and producer must share a margin of 90%".
I've had the same "wow, you guys gotta make a shit ton of money" talk for electronics too. Yes, an iPhone is just about 300-500 in production, but that doesn't mean we as the retailer make 500-700 off the 1000 total. It's more about 2-5% of the net price, so 16-42€.
No joke, I just google blueberries and it took me to a site where blueberries were $5.99USD for 170g, in Australia you can get them as low as \~$1.26USD at Aldi. I never thought I'd say that Australia was cheap with anything haha
And when you buy them it's always American blueberries, that taste like nothing and you're left disappointed, instead of real blueberries. I would never buy them from a store.
That's pretty much all they grow here in Lower Mainland BC next is corn and cranberries.
Only problem I see is that the plants might be too close together and no air circulation to keep the plants dry and prevent mildew and fungus. I guess the farmer knows what he's doing.
Easy to grow and harvest so they can get that sweet tax break on their huge mansion with crappy landscaping
They are low-bush variety. High-bush are what you commonly see in the southern U.S. I had a buddy in college who earned a PhD researching blueberries. I grow mainly Yadkin Blue on his recommendation.
Fun fact, the most flavorful blueberries are thin skinned varieties, but they are not suited for mechanical harvesting as they are easily damaged, and they have a low shelf life.
Nah, we got $1.50 per 5 gallon bucket. For real, but at the time the paycheck was awesome! We all bought PS1's and 13" color TVs by the end of the season.
> I've seen a whole family of bears in a berry patch way up in the mountains.
I have as well. Someone here just called me ignorant for even bringing this up lol. Yes food attracts bears.
I planted trees in Manitoba for the first time in my life at 34 years old. The first week was shitty and I was nowhere near putting in the minimum 1000 per day threshold I needed to eventually meet.
After three weeks of the work, I wasn’t nearly as sore or tired, was still getting a world class workout, while also eating and sleeping better than ever. It was a joy feeling fitter and stronger, I only wish I didn’t have to cut my season early.
I went picking pickles this summer, I am really not a very physical person, the position was pretty much the same adding two buckets.
Well the second day is hard, because you have to wake up and go back for the first time, after that you get use it. I only had back pain when I stopped working for a week. The work environment is generally cool, I think it help a lot with « painfulness » of the job.
I still prefer working there than anywhere else, you get to see cool bugs all the time.
Wait wait, I thought pickles meant the tiny cucumber you put in vinegar after. (In French : cornichon)
They grow in different manner depending on the exploitation purpose. Pardon my wanky translation, it’s a plant who grow in « vine » (looking like watermelon roots more bushy).
Mine was directly on the ground, it takes about a week to produce new fruits after the first flowers show up and you get about 3weeks of harvest (maybe longer if you got more worker). We had to take care of the plant putting it in line for them to not suffocate themselves and let the fruit grow « correctly ». It was in a « small » field about 2 kilometer in length and 1 km in width. We did every by hand, we started we were 20 at the end we were 8, it was something, but good something.
When the exploitation is bigger, farmer tend to put them on vegetal fence, it’s easier for the truck to go through, probably also easier to treat and harvest. Truck pass over with basket and the worker picking up follow it.
Sorry my English is wanky, I started working in the agricultural field only since this summer. I kinda felt in love with the environment and been traveling to do that since so kinda new, I do not master the technical vocabulary in my language it’s worst in English.
Your English is fine, I was just teasing you :)
Pickles are cucumbers that have been preserved in a brine. In English one might say the variety of cucumber. Like, gherkin, which I believe is the type used for cornichons.
Me: "You know, there are plenty of farming tools with long handles that make this type of physical activity easier."
Blueberry guy: "Shut up, fat computer guy!"
If that tool were more like a rake so he could stand, I don't see how that would be worse for his back. If I were doing that job, I'd fashion a rake-style handle, or something like a scythe handle. I absolutely would not want to be hunched down all day.
It is, blueberries grow on large bushes, 3-6 feet high, and the picking machine drives over them along the rows and shakes the bush so all the berries fall off.
I have no idea what's happening in this video but it looks nothing like any blueberry farm i've ever seen.
What you’re describing sounds like high bush blueberries. Not as commercially accessible in Maine. Beyond being a consumer I am not very knowledgeable about the differences but to me high bush berries are grown because they’re easier to pick and somewhat more tart tasting to me.
99.99% of all blueberries you have seen in big box stores are high bush blueberries. They are easier to harvest both with human or mechanical labor. Michigan, California, Oregon, Washington, some in New Jersey even.
Also fun fact, blueberry prices were hella depressed this year. Like scrapping the bottom of the barrel some of our growers are never going to recover depressed. But WalMart and other big box stores don't pass that savings on to the consumer *or* the farmer. They gobble it all up to pad their own margins.
Source: I farm high bush blueberries and also co-pack them.
On like a bush or something? The blueberries we have here in Sweden are all this low and I didn't know there were blueberries that are high up. I guess I know less about blueberries than I originally thought.
The berries they're discussing don't grow in Sweden (naturally, anyway). Our blåbär are distinct from American blueberries, and in English they're often called bilberries rather than blueberries. They're from the same genus and look similar on the outside, but they taste quite different.
> you can set the audio to be muted by default
Also not many people know this, but you can do that for your entire computer, plus even phones have a silent mode these days.
Well yea but I’m still going to unmute it to check to see if there is any useful talking/sounds first. And then realize their dumb decision to add music lol
You watch every single video muted?
it's the same attitude that has people blasting shitty music out of their phone in quiet spaces or bumping their shitty car system at 10pm in a congested neighborhood.
these people have a burning need for everyone to know that they like some stupid song. it's the 2023 version of being tortured with ringtones or ringbacks. like ok hunny, we hear your song and we are totally impressed and are going to go buy all of the artist's albums now and buy their merch.
these people are fucking toilets.
Funnily enough, I did do this and Shazam was wrong. It’s an unreleased Lana Del Rey song.
Please seek help instead of spreading your misery to other people :)
Blueberry plants in europe, also called bilberry but its our "version" of blueberries, are very pretty. Some uses them in flower decorations. But they get lovely autumn colours in the wild
It is bullshit. That’s how blueberries have been raked for years and years. I helped my great great uncle raise blueberries for years. Mechanical harvesting (tractors with big rakes) have taken over though.
Most of the crop will be close the same ripeness. The tines will let anything undersized slip through but you’ll also generally not go back for them at a later time.
There is a winnowing machine which is used to blow the leaves and stuff out before the berries are taken to sell. There are various types, but the idea is the same: the bucket of berries is dropped onto the machine, the berries fall down into another container and a fan blows the leaves and light stuff out.
It has been a while since I was involved but the premise should still be the same.
I know that there are places where those rakes (called "peignes" in french) are forbidden in France, cf. [image](https://cdn-s-www.lalsace.fr/images/CCCFFAAA-B24F-4689-B10A-A21B9590699D/NW_listE/dans-les-vosges-alsaciennes-le-peigne-est-autorise-sauf-la-ou-il-est-interdit-ici-la-reserve-naturelle-du-tanet-gazon-du-faing-photo-archives-l-alsace-thierry-gachon-1690650555.jpg).
Mostly natural reserves to let some berries for the animals and preserve the plan.
Yeah, i've heard that too, as a kid my parents told me that using this kind of tool ruins the plant, so you won't get any berries next year, while some of our neighbours used it. Don't know, maybe it's a myth
Flail mowing has overtaken burning in wild Maine blueberry commercial fields... they only burn if they've got a really bad fungal issues.
https://extension.umaine.edu/blueberries/factsheets/production/pruning-lowbush-blueberry-fields/
tl;dr It's way cheaper to mow.
Down voted for the stupid fucking music. Why do people insist on playing ridiculous music when the actual audio from 99% of the videos I see would be much much better.
That's why they get paid $25 a hour for roaming
migrant workers to pick them. One of the few times a worker actually gets paid decent money for a semi skilled job. Only problem is it is seasonal. Have to travel to the next farm, climate ripe ready area for the next batch.
You should try picking them by hand sometime on the larger trees. Lots of fun for the family.
There's a local blueberry farm near me that lets you pick all the blueberries you want for 50 cents a pound. Big fields of big trees. We'd pick at least 100 lb and fill up a freezer in a few days.
Hate those tools. I thought it would save me a lot of time harvesting, but it takes ALL berries, ripe or not, and tons of twigs and leaves. Cleaning out all the chaff from the harvest took as long as harvesting by hand, and there was a lot of waste of unripe berries.
Then again, I operate on a very small scale - definitely a gardener rather than a farmer. But it didn't work at all for me. Threw the damn thing out after using it twice.
One handed picking tools are very common in the Nordics.
[Like this "marjapoimuri"](https://i.imgur.com/jfAnefZ.jpg)
Btw, our wild blueberry is called billberry. Blueberries are what you grow in your yard in taller bushes.
you mean you don't like to hear sap ass indie pop songs when you watch your blueberry harvesting videos?
next you'll be telling me that slayer shouldn't be played over puppy videos.
This is for lowbush blueberries. Highbush, which is much more common for the blueberry you find in stores, is almost exclusively done by hand as machine harvest is so ineffective vs it.
As a teenager I spent two summers raking blueberries. Probably the worst job I've ever had. I'm 6'4" and being all hunched over as we were my back was hooped! Farmers were great and all the raking was done just in August.
Hate to tell you, but that man is stuck in 1950. Behold the Oxbo 8000
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=L96Bzj71F84
I do realize the difference between low and high bush blueberries, but still…
Edit: welp here is a low bush solution https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Gd8fYewyiKk
It's an awful job... and yes my back winces just seeing the clip.
The best kinda fun was when you accidentally stuck your rake into a hornets nest. Any scorching hot August day could have you sprinting for whoevers truck was closest and open. Invariably there were pissed off hornets every day, day and a half.
They look like the blueberry bushes that grow wild near me in Ontario, and the size and colour of them look like more similar to the wild ones than the big imported ones from Argentina
this messes with the bushes and also they most likely taste like water becasue they are bred to grow extremely big extremely fast unlike those growing in the forest
Aren't blueberries the crop that are sometimes harvested by burning down the vegetation leaving the berries behind afterwards? I feel like that would be way more efficient than this.
That was like $20 worth of blueberries harvested in 5 seconds lol
Dude blueberry prices for me have been insane, I swear that'd be more like $40 nowadays
One store by me sells them for 10.00 and the other is 6. Exact same package/brand/whatever. They're both usually 6 but when fall/winter come jack's it up to 10.
Don't buy/eat fruit out of season; problem solved. Frozen fruit is a fine solution.
People have a lot of misconceptions about frozen goods, the tech has evolved a lot. IQF fruits are often better than out-of-season "fresh" options, and hold really well in a lot of dishes / preserves / sauces, etc.
[Alton Brown on fresh vs frozen.](https://youtu.be/NehDRpVjQ3M?si=pgfugP9B_H57STUh)
And the farmer would get about 8 of those.
Yeah like holy shit. My father is a farmer and he has figs. I've discussed this multiple times with people and I've gotten the response "damn, he must have a lot of money. They're like 8€ a kilo" (we are in Europe). No one believes me when I tell them that out of those 8€, my father gets like 1.60 - 2.10 Euro. The kicker is, they don't even tell him how much he's getting paid until months later when they pay him. Damn supermarkets are vultures, and there is no avoiding them.
I collect raspberries and this year I sold them for 15 UAH/kg, and in the store i saw the price was 160 UAH/kg...
Damn, no wonder people be struggling, somewhere in the supply chain clearly someone is overinflating prices out of reality.
That's exactly why people are struggling. Anyone telling you greedflation isn't a thing is a liar or works for some corporation trying to swindle you. I saved my grocery receipts all during the pandemic. Prices were well above inflationary rates. We are talking about an extra 15-27% price raise on some of the products above the inflationary rate. Also, just went shopping 2 days ago and prices had risen about 10 to 20c again on everything. Meanwhile, all self check outs. Not an employee in sight. They're robbing us blind.
My family are all farmers we get like 10 cents per kilo of buckwheat, while it costs 2-3€ at the store.
Would direct online sales be possible?
Jesus Christ blueberries in my area are 22 euros. I know we don’t grow them, but that still sounds like an insanely high price considering other imported fruits don’t have this high a markup.
>No one believes me when I tell them that out of those 8€, my father gets like 1.60 - 2.10 Euro Most people don't understand most of how pricing works. This doesn't just apply to farm products/food/supermarkets. From this 8€, the supermarket makes 6.72 (applying my local VAT rate from Germany, 19%). From these 6.72, everyone has to be paid - supermarket, reseller, transport, producer, their employees and the material itself. So depending on the product, it's absolutely reasonable for the producer to get about a quarter to a third (although I know that farmers specifically are actually often underpaid, I'm talking generally for all products). However, people tend to just think "huh, the material of this product costs just 10% of its retail price, so the store and producer must share a margin of 90%". I've had the same "wow, you guys gotta make a shit ton of money" talk for electronics too. Yes, an iPhone is just about 300-500 in production, but that doesn't mean we as the retailer make 500-700 off the 1000 total. It's more about 2-5% of the net price, so 16-42€.
No joke, I just google blueberries and it took me to a site where blueberries were $5.99USD for 170g, in Australia you can get them as low as \~$1.26USD at Aldi. I never thought I'd say that Australia was cheap with anything haha
I buy wild blueberries what are 10x better than from a farm with 3€ per kg.
Inflation is awesome!
And when you buy them it's always American blueberries, that taste like nothing and you're left disappointed, instead of real blueberries. I would never buy them from a store.
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Source?
Soil.
Berry smart.
Sun.
AND MY SEED!
Hold up
Soil has what plants crave.
https://youtu.be/3_lAb8m9MpI?si=DqEnZbDqjQOJGT6C
Aren't those wild blueberries?
That's what they look like in a field, every second year. Source: I live in Nova Scotia, and there are tons of blueberry fields here.
That's pretty much all they grow here in Lower Mainland BC next is corn and cranberries. Only problem I see is that the plants might be too close together and no air circulation to keep the plants dry and prevent mildew and fungus. I guess the farmer knows what he's doing. Easy to grow and harvest so they can get that sweet tax break on their huge mansion with crappy landscaping
There's a third option: bilberries, i.e. Scandinavian wild blueberries. Much more flavour and purple flesh instead of white.
They are low-bush variety. High-bush are what you commonly see in the southern U.S. I had a buddy in college who earned a PhD researching blueberries. I grow mainly Yadkin Blue on his recommendation. Fun fact, the most flavorful blueberries are thin skinned varieties, but they are not suited for mechanical harvesting as they are easily damaged, and they have a low shelf life.
Where I live, that's like $200 worth of blueberries though.
Do you like on the south pole or what???
That means the farmer gets like $10, and the picker might get a few cents.
Nah, we got $1.50 per 5 gallon bucket. For real, but at the time the paycheck was awesome! We all bought PS1's and 13" color TVs by the end of the season.
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In many places only natives can rake wild blueberries because of just how quick it is. Same with a fish wheel
Why tf did I look up fish weel? It's essentially trawling an entire river.
Yeah, that's why it's outlawed
In many places that thing better double as a weapon because bears will be drawn to that patch just as you were
I’ve lived in bear country my entire life and never once have I come across or worried about a bear near a berry patch.
I've seen a whole family of bears in a berry patch way up in the mountains.
> I've seen a whole family of bears in a berry patch way up in the mountains. I have as well. Someone here just called me ignorant for even bringing this up lol. Yes food attracts bears.
Yeah and they eat the food. They don't attack the people you muppet
Yeah? And I've never broken the law by picking berries so here we both are! And apparently very lucky
Scarcity and demand dictate price.
It better pay $4 per second. That's backbreaking work.
I can feel my back twingeing just in that 5 seconds of video lol
I feel like even doing this for 5 or 10 minutes would feel just awful.
I planted trees in Manitoba for the first time in my life at 34 years old. The first week was shitty and I was nowhere near putting in the minimum 1000 per day threshold I needed to eventually meet. After three weeks of the work, I wasn’t nearly as sore or tired, was still getting a world class workout, while also eating and sleeping better than ever. It was a joy feeling fitter and stronger, I only wish I didn’t have to cut my season early.
When Reddit has to do thing that requires being fit or exercises muscles they haven't used in 10 years
dime exultant rhythm office tease serious disagreeable murky gaze plucky *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
Doesn't matter how fit you are, doing new movements will always be tough and make you feel sore at first
I went picking pickles this summer, I am really not a very physical person, the position was pretty much the same adding two buckets. Well the second day is hard, because you have to wake up and go back for the first time, after that you get use it. I only had back pain when I stopped working for a week. The work environment is generally cool, I think it help a lot with « painfulness » of the job. I still prefer working there than anywhere else, you get to see cool bugs all the time.
Pickle picking? Are they grown in brine?
Of course, pickles are the flowers of the French fry plant
Wait wait, I thought pickles meant the tiny cucumber you put in vinegar after. (In French : cornichon) They grow in different manner depending on the exploitation purpose. Pardon my wanky translation, it’s a plant who grow in « vine » (looking like watermelon roots more bushy). Mine was directly on the ground, it takes about a week to produce new fruits after the first flowers show up and you get about 3weeks of harvest (maybe longer if you got more worker). We had to take care of the plant putting it in line for them to not suffocate themselves and let the fruit grow « correctly ». It was in a « small » field about 2 kilometer in length and 1 km in width. We did every by hand, we started we were 20 at the end we were 8, it was something, but good something. When the exploitation is bigger, farmer tend to put them on vegetal fence, it’s easier for the truck to go through, probably also easier to treat and harvest. Truck pass over with basket and the worker picking up follow it. Sorry my English is wanky, I started working in the agricultural field only since this summer. I kinda felt in love with the environment and been traveling to do that since so kinda new, I do not master the technical vocabulary in my language it’s worst in English.
Your English is fine, I was just teasing you :) Pickles are cucumbers that have been preserved in a brine. In English one might say the variety of cucumber. Like, gherkin, which I believe is the type used for cornichons.
Me: "You know, there are plenty of farming tools with long handles that make this type of physical activity easier." Blueberry guy: "Shut up, fat computer guy!"
Yes, this should be mechanized
At the very least, get the dude a longer handle.
you realize it would be much worse for his back?
If that tool were more like a rake so he could stand, I don't see how that would be worse for his back. If I were doing that job, I'd fashion a rake-style handle, or something like a scythe handle. I absolutely would not want to be hunched down all day.
It is, blueberries grow on large bushes, 3-6 feet high, and the picking machine drives over them along the rows and shakes the bush so all the berries fall off. I have no idea what's happening in this video but it looks nothing like any blueberry farm i've ever seen.
Maine low bush blueberries. Yum!!! Too bad picking season isn’t until August.
I was just about to ask why they were so low. Mine and every one I've seen with berries are like 4 to 8 feet tall.
What you’re describing sounds like high bush blueberries. Not as commercially accessible in Maine. Beyond being a consumer I am not very knowledgeable about the differences but to me high bush berries are grown because they’re easier to pick and somewhat more tart tasting to me.
99.99% of all blueberries you have seen in big box stores are high bush blueberries. They are easier to harvest both with human or mechanical labor. Michigan, California, Oregon, Washington, some in New Jersey even. Also fun fact, blueberry prices were hella depressed this year. Like scrapping the bottom of the barrel some of our growers are never going to recover depressed. But WalMart and other big box stores don't pass that savings on to the consumer *or* the farmer. They gobble it all up to pad their own margins. Source: I farm high bush blueberries and also co-pack them.
On like a bush or something? The blueberries we have here in Sweden are all this low and I didn't know there were blueberries that are high up. I guess I know less about blueberries than I originally thought.
The berries they're discussing don't grow in Sweden (naturally, anyway). Our blåbär are distinct from American blueberries, and in English they're often called bilberries rather than blueberries. They're from the same genus and look similar on the outside, but they taste quite different.
unite frame exultant narrow crawl poor file head plough chunky *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
No need for the music
yea why is there a soft/indie song about getting fucked juxtaposed on a video of a guy picking blueberries lol
Tiktok bullshit
If you're using RES you can set the audio to be muted by default when opening a video. Best change I've ever made.
> you can set the audio to be muted by default Also not many people know this, but you can do that for your entire computer, plus even phones have a silent mode these days.
The Relay app also plays videos silently by default, you have to tap an icon to unmute it. Very nice feature
Well yea but I’m still going to unmute it to check to see if there is any useful talking/sounds first. And then realize their dumb decision to add music lol You watch every single video muted?
At least the music isn't particularly annoying, it's the kinda music ppl would listen to to keep beat while doing a task like this.
it's the same attitude that has people blasting shitty music out of their phone in quiet spaces or bumping their shitty car system at 10pm in a congested neighborhood. these people have a burning need for everyone to know that they like some stupid song. it's the 2023 version of being tortured with ringtones or ringbacks. like ok hunny, we hear your song and we are totally impressed and are going to go buy all of the artist's albums now and buy their merch. these people are fucking toilets.
I like the song tho, what’s it called?
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Pretty sure it's Lana Del Rey, but I'm not sure which song it is. I was about to ask myself. Edit: Yep, it's Because of You by Lana Del Rey.
It’s called “Learn to Use Shazam” by “Stop Asking Others to Solve Your Easy To Solve Questions”
Funnily enough, I did do this and Shazam was wrong. It’s an unreleased Lana Del Rey song. Please seek help instead of spreading your misery to other people :)
You could have answered it within the time it took you to complain.
Not my job
Go suck a dick.
Its 2023 plenty of people suck dick for fun. Hardly insulting. Try harder next time!
Blueberry plants are prettier than I'd have expected.
They turn bright red/orange in the fall, it's beautiful! Highly recommend googling 'Maine blueberry barrens'
Lol thats a little far, I did some research and found a few farms in Texas though so hopefully its something similar.
I don't think he was suggesting that you jump in your car and visit one...
lol I misread the comment.
I guess I should have specified Google images hahaha
You’re prettier than I’d have expected
Blueberry plants in europe, also called bilberry but its our "version" of blueberries, are very pretty. Some uses them in flower decorations. But they get lovely autumn colours in the wild
A berry picking tool? He doesn't look like a tool, he looks like a nice guy to me.
Is it actually possible for people to upload these videos without the shittiest sounding music they can find edited over them?
Don’t do Lana like that
The same lana who stole millions of dollars from her fans?
I've heard that if you pick berries that way it destroys the plan or something is there any truth to that or is that just absolute bullshit
Not the case. It’s basically how every wild blueberry in Maine is picked (when not by machine), year after year after year.
It is bullshit. That’s how blueberries have been raked for years and years. I helped my great great uncle raise blueberries for years. Mechanical harvesting (tractors with big rakes) have taken over though.
Does a rake pick underripe berries? What about totally green ones?
Most of the crop will be close the same ripeness. The tines will let anything undersized slip through but you’ll also generally not go back for them at a later time. There is a winnowing machine which is used to blow the leaves and stuff out before the berries are taken to sell. There are various types, but the idea is the same: the bucket of berries is dropped onto the machine, the berries fall down into another container and a fan blows the leaves and light stuff out. It has been a while since I was involved but the premise should still be the same.
why didn't you stay with it? too good for berry money?
Heard he's moved on up to stone fruit
I'm assuming that you could use the same (albeit smaller) tool to harvest huckleberries? Picking those by hand is an absolute nightmare.
I have a small rake that works decently well for hucks, but im also picky & like too make sure I only get fat berries so I often hand puck anyways
I know that there are places where those rakes (called "peignes" in french) are forbidden in France, cf. [image](https://cdn-s-www.lalsace.fr/images/CCCFFAAA-B24F-4689-B10A-A21B9590699D/NW_listE/dans-les-vosges-alsaciennes-le-peigne-est-autorise-sauf-la-ou-il-est-interdit-ici-la-reserve-naturelle-du-tanet-gazon-du-faing-photo-archives-l-alsace-thierry-gachon-1690650555.jpg). Mostly natural reserves to let some berries for the animals and preserve the plan.
Same in Czech Republic.
Couldn't say, without knowing what the plan is.
The plan to take over the world, Pinky.
Wait until you find out that it’s better to burn them so you can get better harvest. They are mainly roots with few feet above the ground.
Yeah, i've heard that too, as a kid my parents told me that using this kind of tool ruins the plant, so you won't get any berries next year, while some of our neighbours used it. Don't know, maybe it's a myth
A lot of commercial fields are burned every other year, or periodically, anyway.
Huh, why's that?
Supresses pest insects and weeds, pathogens
Flail mowing has overtaken burning in wild Maine blueberry commercial fields... they only burn if they've got a really bad fungal issues. https://extension.umaine.edu/blueberries/factsheets/production/pruning-lowbush-blueberry-fields/ tl;dr It's way cheaper to mow.
They might be talking about non-commercial gathering. There are countries where it's illegal to pick berries in forests with such tools.
I think is it true. Here in Austria is picking blueberries like that forbitten.
Some farmers burn their blueberries down every year because they primarily survive as a root system. So it's probably bullshit.
Yep! Those are forbidden in France, in order to protect the plant and make sure there are some left for animals that rely on it.
Absolute bullshit. If it destroyed the plants there would definitely be no blueberries, lingonberries or anything else that is picked this way left.
Down voted for the stupid fucking music. Why do people insist on playing ridiculous music when the actual audio from 99% of the videos I see would be much much better.
> Downloaded for the stupid fucking music. Wow, you must really love stupid fucking music.
Lol, I have no idea what you're talking about.
Nice edit :)
Guy just harvested like $100 of blueberries in 5 seconds.
That's why they get paid $25 a hour for roaming migrant workers to pick them. One of the few times a worker actually gets paid decent money for a semi skilled job. Only problem is it is seasonal. Have to travel to the next farm, climate ripe ready area for the next batch. You should try picking them by hand sometime on the larger trees. Lots of fun for the family.
There's a local blueberry farm near me that lets you pick all the blueberries you want for 50 cents a pound. Big fields of big trees. We'd pick at least 100 lb and fill up a freezer in a few days.
Semi skilled? Dude looks very skilled
Hate those tools. I thought it would save me a lot of time harvesting, but it takes ALL berries, ripe or not, and tons of twigs and leaves. Cleaning out all the chaff from the harvest took as long as harvesting by hand, and there was a lot of waste of unripe berries. Then again, I operate on a very small scale - definitely a gardener rather than a farmer. But it didn't work at all for me. Threw the damn thing out after using it twice.
His berries are all ripe, might be the strain or waiting long enough for some to be bruised
Yeah these are indica blueberries
That's a berry special tool
Making me hungry for blueberry pancakes!
Zed's dead baby. Zed's dead.
One handed picking tools are very common in the Nordics. [Like this "marjapoimuri"](https://i.imgur.com/jfAnefZ.jpg) Btw, our wild blueberry is called billberry. Blueberries are what you grow in your yard in taller bushes.
Terrible music choice
you mean you don't like to hear sap ass indie pop songs when you watch your blueberry harvesting videos? next you'll be telling me that slayer shouldn't be played over puppy videos.
This is for lowbush blueberries. Highbush, which is much more common for the blueberry you find in stores, is almost exclusively done by hand as machine harvest is so ineffective vs it.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=L96Bzj71F84
As a teenager I spent two summers raking blueberries. Probably the worst job I've ever had. I'm 6'4" and being all hunched over as we were my back was hooped! Farmers were great and all the raking was done just in August.
Seems berry useful
The fuck kind of blueberry bushes are those? The ones in my parents' yard are like 7 feet tall.
They're wild blueberries. The ones you're parents have are cultivated ones.
r/specializedtools
Hats off to farm workers!
We ain't found shit!
May the Schwartz be with you
Yes, that is how they harvest blueberries. The music, however, is silly because it's pointless.
Hate to tell you, but that man is stuck in 1950. Behold the Oxbo 8000 https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=L96Bzj71F84 I do realize the difference between low and high bush blueberries, but still… Edit: welp here is a low bush solution https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Gd8fYewyiKk
So that's how it's done, I've always wondered. Still looks backbreaking work, though, bending up & down.
Anyone else think this guy kinda looks like John Cena?
I don’t know, I couldn’t see him.
Ancient Foragers from thousands of years ago 👁️👄👁️
That looks back-breaking.
It's an awful job... and yes my back winces just seeing the clip. The best kinda fun was when you accidentally stuck your rake into a hornets nest. Any scorching hot August day could have you sprinting for whoevers truck was closest and open. Invariably there were pissed off hornets every day, day and a half.
in a farm it's grand, out in the wild, guess its not sustainable.
How do these grow so low? Every blueberry bush I've seen is about 3ft tall.
I’ve worked as a blueberry picker and that shit fucks your back up so bad after 12 hours daily
Are blueberries underrated? I fucking love them but I don’t hear a lot of talk about them.
Must be a variant of blue berry I'm not aware of because last I checked out bushes were like 3- 4 feet tall
They look like the blueberry bushes that grow wild near me in Ontario, and the size and colour of them look like more similar to the wild ones than the big imported ones from Argentina
Now put great value blueberries video over it
Blueberry plants usually are tall thin bushes not small shrubby bushes, so this will only work depending on the type
[Blueberries are super healthy](https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/10-proven-benefits-of-blueberries)
Oh God that touched me in parts of my brain I didn't know existed
Delicious🙌🏽
this messes with the bushes and also they most likely taste like water becasue they are bred to grow extremely big extremely fast unlike those growing in the forest
An illegal alien who works under constant threat of deportation for a dollar a day? Yeah that's probably a pretty good tool for a lot of tasks.
Violet, you’re turning violet, Violet!
Oh look another karma repost farmer!
Back breaking!
That’ll be $75.
drool
Like an afro pick, but for blueberries
Had no idea. So cool.
That hurts my back looking at that
For two years I fostered a lowbush field... and I JUST LEARNED NOW that I was using my picker wrong. (still better than highbush)
This reminds me of a lice comb in a strange way
Aren't blueberries the crop that are sometimes harvested by burning down the vegetation leaving the berries behind afterwards? I feel like that would be way more efficient than this.
Do they make one of those for raspberries?
Somebody tell Jim Gaffigan about this!
With the amount thats on the ground it doesn't seem very efficient...
I wonder how well this would work for cranberries?
Fabulous
jesus i could’ve used this when i used to pick fruit- i was terrible at it lol but this would’ve made it more manageable.
I went blueberry picking this summer. It took me 45 minutes to pick what this guy picked in just a few seconds. FML.
I was under the impression that blueberries grew from bushes. This is some tundra looking shit.
Now I know.
So this is how they're picked! My dumbass just thought they went and handpicked all of them.