Mulberries Are for the Birds!

Mulberries are fine when they are on someone else's tree (preferably a block away!)

When I was a kid, we spent the summers in rural Northern NJ. We actually lived in a log cabin that belonged to my grandparents. There was a mulberry tree in the back yard, unfortunately next to the clothes line! When the mulberries ripened, the birds would sit on the close line after scarfing down the berries and poop on the sheets. Every sheet we owned had blue polka dots. If the berries had really matured, the birds would get drunk on them and actually stagger around the ground.

My neighbor made mulberry wine, but I was too young to try it. My greatgrandfather had a grape orchard in his back yard in Bklyn. He made his own pesach wine every year for the next year's ceremony. That came to an end when the corks popped one year and the wine squirted all over the basement where it was stored. The room was purple forever after.

Posted by Judith Sobel