I want to thank the southern gent who told us about using a wide toothed
comb to pick elderberries. Today at a rummage sale I bought a dog's curry
comb for 25 cents. Its got good strong metal teeth perpendicular to a
substantial handle with a hole in it for a loop of twine to go around the
wrist. I'm looking forward to using it next summer to pick elderberries.

I wrote here that I was trying to dry elderberris on the stem instead of
labouriously picking them off the stem first. The berries dried okay but
so did the stems. When I tried separating the dry berries from the dry
stems the stems broke into little pices. I can't separate them from the
dried berries. I was able to get rid of a some of the stems by sifting the
berries though a collander. I got rid of a lot more by putting the berries
in a large salad bowl and flipping the stem pieces which weigh less than
the berries to the outer edge. There's still quite a few tiny peices of
dry stem in with the dry berries but not enough to keep me from using the
berries.


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