Very Few Thornless Blackberries This Year

    The thornless blackberry crop has been decimated this year by 13 months of drought, and continued unusually hot and dry weather in the last 3 weeks.  Thornless blackberry harvest started on July 1, but customers have picked only 11 quarts of berries total during the first 3 days of harvest this year.  Very few berries set this spring, and many berries that did set are now shriveling on the plants instead of ripening.

Our thornless blackberry crop is very sparse this year. I took this photo last night, shortly before most berries that had turned black were picked.

   We do irrigate; we've applied over 3000 gallons of water to the blackberry planting in the last 2 weeks alone (plus many thousands of gallons last summer), but when temperatures soar over 100 F each day, as they did most days last week, the plants need more water than we can apply.  Most of the potential 2023 blackberry crop was already lost to the summer & fall 2022 drought, as few canes grew last summer that would have fruited this summer.

   We are open our morning hours on July 4, but there will be next to no berries to pick.  Thornless blackberries are sold pick-your-own only, for $4.74 per quart + sales tax.

   We'll have a reduced peach crop from about July 20 to Aug. 30 this year, as shown in the sidebar at left under Crop Sales Seasons.  Sales dates for all our crops have been updated in the sidebar at left to reflect current and expected conditions.  This also shows which crops we sell harvested, and which crops we sell pick-your-own.

   We still have many long-keeping 'Enterprise' and 'Gold Rush' harvested apples for sale for the next couple months.  See the June 4, 2023 blog post for prices on apples.  This coming Sept. and Oct., the apple crop will be very sparse, but we have many great-quality apples now, so buy them while we have them.  I give taste samples, and almost everyone who tries these apples loves them and buys some.

The only crop on our highway sign is still Apples. Brenda's Berries is the name of the business (short for Brenda's Berries & Orchards). We will not put up our Blackberries sign this year, since the crop is so low.

   Those visiting us from Joplin, MO should take 7th St. to Galena, KS then Hwy. 66 to Riverton and Baxter Springs, KS, then Hwy. 166 for 15.0 miles west to Brenda's Berries & Orchards as usual.  Hwy. 166 is closed from Baxter Springs to 4.0 miles east of Baxter Springs for road work this summer.

   For payment, we take cash or checks (from any state), but NO credit cards or debit cards.  Please bring you checkbook or enough cash to cover the amount of fruit you'll buy.  Thanks.