Came up with a pretty good way to de stem those little ederberries.
After a few weekends of trial and error the process below is what I
came up with. Probabally this was discovered before, so I'm not
applying for a patent, just figured I'd share

- when picking the clusters pull off large stalks
- put all clusters into a large container or bucket
- cover with cold water by several inches
- leave for an hour. This makes the bugs float up to the top and
maybe softens the stems.
- wash off the bugs
- reach in and gently grab a double handfull of stems.
- gently roll them like a pizza dough, the berries fall back into the
water. Don't press too hard you'll smash to many berries.
- repeat until all/most berries are destemed
- in the bucket/container the ripe berries will sink and the unripe
will float for the most part
- scoop off the floating berries with a strainer
- drain off water for the remaining berries

good luck with dem berries,
hap

"hap" wrote in message
oups.com...
Came up with a pretty good way to de stem those little ederberries.
After a few weekends of trial and error the process below is what I
came up with. Probabally this was discovered before, so I'm not
applying for a patent, just figured I'd share

- when picking the clusters pull off large stalks
- put all clusters into a large container or bucket
- cover with cold water by several inches
- leave for an hour. This makes the bugs float up to the top and
maybe softens the stems.
- wash off the bugs
- reach in and gently grab a double handfull of stems.
- gently roll them like a pizza dough, the berries fall back into the
water. Don't press too hard you'll smash to many berries.
- repeat until all/most berries are destemed
- in the bucket/container the ripe berries will sink and the unripe
will float for the most part
- scoop off the floating berries with a strainer
- drain off water for the remaining berries

good luck with dem berries,
hap

Hap,

Good idea. I comb them off the bush then sift through hardware cloth.
Details at:

http://mywebpages.comcast.net/rbfarm/eldrpick.html

Paul

Paul:

The shield shaped bug on your site is commonly called a stink bug.
Nasty little things. Don't get them excited, just let them leave!

Steve
Oregon


Pavel314" wrote:
Hap,

Good idea. I comb them off the bush then sift through hardware cloth.
Details at:

http://mywebpages.comcast.net/rbfarm/eldrpick.html

Paul

I didn't know the yellow stuff came from the stems. I've got some
froze with some stems, might give the hardware cloth trick a shot with
them frozen. Yea ditto on the stink bugs. Don't kill them, nasty.