Berry pickers around Bristol Bay have noticed an early pop to this season’s crop. Is it an early year, or part of a longer-term trend?
Patricia Carscallen's kitchen table is filled with jars of homemade jams and jellies. They're made with a variety of berries, most of which she grows right here on her spread at Unicorn Gardens.
Some are wild, and some she’s brought in. Like this little patch of Sitka-cross strawberries. Too little snow the past couple winters has actually helped kill off some of these, but one patch is still thriving. No bigger than the size of a thumb and delicately colored, they pack a lot of flavor.
"People from Outside look at that and say 'that's not a strawberry.' Because they're little and they're white and they don't look impressive," she says.
But hey, looks aren’t everything. They’re ripe and ready, and that’s the important part. And Carscallen says pretty much everything is riper and readier earlier this year. It was the same story down in Ekuk, where setnetter Clara Torrison says this year she got to enjoy some local berries before heading back home to Eagle River.
“A lot of times we miss out. They’re ready just when we’re ready to leave. There was a group of us that went up the other day, we were celebrating my birthday earlier and everyone gave me their berries for a present.”
Some local varieties of berries have already peaked; a month or more before normal. So, is this a one off season? Is it part of a longer-term trend? Maybe it’s a little bit of both. Leif Albertson is the district agent for UAF Extension in Bethel.
“To say that that’s part of a trend or just an extreme year is pretty tough, but I would just say anecdotally, it seems like there’s been a lot of weird years lately.”
He says the warmer than usual summer hasn’t been so friendly to some other things that usually like western Alaska’s mild temperatures, like spinach or kale. That’s evident in Patricia Carscallen’s garden, too, where there just hasn’t been much rain on top of the hot weather. But, there’s an upside. If the growing season is getting a little warmer and a little longer, it means more chances to experiment.
“I have to keep reminding myself to try stuff that I tried 30 years ago and wasn’t successful with because now, it might work.”