The blueberry forest

I kept my promise and went to pick blueberries this weekend. I was superoptimistic that I would  come back home with some 4–5 litres of blueberries but barely collected 3. I even had a project during the week to empty an ice cream box, so I could reach that target of mine (since I'm lacking boxes at home). Even though I ate ice cream every evening ever since I bought the package, there was still half left this morning.  At least now I can eat ice cream with blueberries!

The location I had chosen to go was something I spotted last weekend on my trip to Oslo. Not every forest here is a blueberry forest, and this was the first one I saw so far. It has became my favourite place around here, and I think I will be spending lots time there in the coming months. It is little more than 10 km from home on a higher ground with pine trees, spruce trees, and also some deciduous trees. On the ground you can find blueberries, lingonberries (not ripe yet, nor even flowering), common cow-wheat (Melampyrum pratense/kangasmaitikka/navadni črnilec) and heather (Calluna vulgaris/kanerva/jesenska vresa) among other typically associated plant species in that plant community (phytocenosis).

The forest was also full of paths. But only one was really accessible with bicycle–it being wide enough, without guarantee it would be drivable. On the map I could see from the tracking application I use on my phone (Maverick) that all the paths in the forest were shown with the same classification–no distinguish was made between the bigger and smaller paths, which is actually what I'm doing back home for thesis from geography–to create such a map which does classify paths in a forest according their sizes.

I end up picking blueberries quite close to the path, simply because I did not know what should I do with my bike, and secondly I did not feel like carrying my big skiing backpack in the squatting position commonly used when picking blueberries. So I kept my eyes on my belongings while providing meals to hungry mosquitoes. But it was worth it! I'm a forest person; basically grew up playing in the forests building shelters and swimming in dark-watered forest lakes.

At the end of my not-that-successful picking, I took a long tour in the forest following the "main"path. The path was actually not that long, it got together with the actual main path quite fast just making a short loop around a hill. The path was full of roots and rocks of all sizes and shapes, sometimes also mud. And I could not help myself noticing how I had been picking blueberries in a totally wrong spot; everywhere I looked all the blueberries were much bigger and plentiful. So I stopped every now and then and picked a handful of antioxidant-rich berries, which is probably why I never even had to open my sandwich I had packed with me.

But I did not stop only because of the blueberries. I was mesmerized by the beautiful landscape that reminded me of the forest near my grandparents place–also a blueberry forest. The pictures I took will never tell the story I saw with my yes and heart, especially since they are taken with my phone– in which I don't know how to change setting so it could capture the light as I see it landing on the spots that I have chosen to share with you.

I was not in a hurry to get back home. It was also not too hot that I would have had to hurry due the blueberries I was carrying. So I took a longer tour back home, checking out couple of "lakes" I spotted with my map application. The first one was just under a hectare big, where as the second one was 1,5 ha. Both of them had some local people enjoying the warm day, either in the water or along the shores (one girl even had a hammoc). These lakes were really dark. The humus content (organic matter) is high in such lakes coloring them dark. The humus leaches from the surrounding soils and gives the water brownish color as well as acidic pH.

Last but not least my Saturday trip to the blueberry forest fulfilled my long lasting desire to spend a whole day in a forest similar to my childhood, with the only company being the mosquitoes.

PS. And I even found some wild rasberries.