We went looking for blueberries this evening, up to Second Bridge,
and it appears as though it is going to be another poor year for blueberries this year. I suspect that all of the rain we have is coming at a critical time of the blossoming and messing with the pollination. Last year there were literally no berries to be found, and this year is almost as bad. Leah got about a half a cup yesterday.
Now I should explain to those who are used to southern blue berries that even in a good year the crops are nothing like down south. The berries are small, less than a quarter inch in diameter and though they can be relatively abundant you are not going to pick handfuls at a time. But they are tasty and worth the effort of picking them. Besides, even a bad day berry picking is pretty good.
What I did find a lot of however were mushrooms, something that we don’t see alot of here. There were several different kinds,
although I must confess that I know very little about mushrooms and other fungi and the only ones that I recognized were puffballs (Lycoperdon sp.).
I showed Travis the cloud of spores that are released when one stomps on the puffball, and took great delight in watching him seek out and stomp on every puffball within a ten metre distance. If you can’t enjoy the pleasures of creating mini puffball clouds it is time to check your pulse.
When we arrived back in Arctic Bay we saw the new sailboat, whose sail we could see in Adam’s Sound on our drive out, anchored in the bay. The Pelagic Australis is huge at 75 feet LOA with almost a 20 foot beam. It fairly dwarfs the Jotun Arctic. I understand that it has just come from Greenland and that it too will be making an attempt at the Northwest Passage this season. 