The Red Raspberry Patch, Vol. 5

June 9, 2009

Dear Friends,
The Bumble Bees have been swarming the Sumac!  On the Sumac growing under the Catalpa, probably 6 to 8 years old, and 3 1\2 inches at the base, with a crown of perhaps 15 feet at a height of 18 feet, there are maybe 40 Bumble Bees.  Those not busy gathering nectar and spreading pollen are chasing their rivals, and the two buzz off from the crown of the tree four or  five feet, twirl and joust around each other, then split apart and fly back to the berry clusters, graze awhile, and repeat the contest over and over.  There are also honeybees tending the Sumac, when they're not busy with the red raspberries that grow below.  I estimate that if all the red raspberry flowers produce fruit, we will have 12 gallons of fruit.  A record! 
 
The Sumacs will grow a nice crop of berries, too.  They make such showy clusters of fuzzy, crimson-red, B.B.-Sized, upside-down grape  berries, which in the dead of winter the birds relish.  I recently read that the Sumac berry is traded as a spice in Iran, Iraq, and Afghanistan.  They use it as a substitute for lemon, which doesn't keep well in desert climates.  Our indigenous ancestors used it to make a medicinal "lemonade".  Might we not harvest our "spare" Sumac berries and trade them to those countries for a little measure of Peace?  This evening there was a new insect on the Sumac flowers, an all-black butterfly about the size of a Monarch.  Maybe a good omen.

                                                                 tommy