Red huckleberry sauce on salmon, shrimp, and crab, red huckleberry stuffed halibut rolls, in spring rolls, in salads, dipping sauce for sushi.
My dad slows Huckleberry, his bright red side-by-side four-wheeler, to a stop alongside the dirt road. I climb out of the passenger seat. Oscar, my border collie, jumps out behind me. I grab my backpack and buckets and hang one bucket around my neck. The other I stuff into my backpack. Before me is a hillside of fallen logs, stumps and bushes. Bright red huckleberry bushes dot the hillside. It’s fall and time to pick red huckleberries for making jams and jellies and to store for winter.
Mickey Prescott and Oscar scout for red huckleberries. (Vivian Faith Prescott | For the Juneau Empire)
From the road, you train your eyes to spot the difference between a blueberry and a red huckleberry bush, which is why it’s easier in the late summer and early fall when the leaves turn redder. In summer, the green leaves are slightly smaller than blueberry’s and there’re more leaves on the bushes. To find red huckleberries, look near stump patches, as they grow in places where trees have fallen. Red huckleberries are also found at the edges of muskegs tucked beneath a hemlock or spruce.
Red huckleberry jelly and jam, red huckleberry/spruce tip jelly and red huckleberry/blueberry jam.
I wear a ball cap, rain pants and a raincoat because yesterday it poured and the bushes are soaked. My dad heads toward the bushes beside the small parking area. He’ll pick the lower bushes. I cross the road and step across the ditch onto the hill. I steady myself and grab onto a small tree branch and climb.
I stop at a bush about five feet high, thick with plump red berries. They look like red blueberries, but they’re Vaccinium parvifolium, red huckleberry. The Lingít word for red huckleberry, tleikatán, sounds like tl.ache.uh.tunk.
In Sealaska’s online Tlingit dictionary you’ll find the sentences: Tleikatánk kanat’á een yak’éi: Red huckleberries are good with blueberries. And Tleikatánk áwé kanat’áx xoo yéi nateech: Red huckleberries are always among blueberries. This is traditional knowledge — when scouting for blueberries you’ll discover an occasional patch of red huckleberries.
Red huckleberry muffins, bread, cobbler, buckle and red huckleberry pie.
I find my footing and pull a loaded branch toward me. Oscar sniffs the grass. I pick a few berries and plop them into the bucket, making a hollow sound. Somewhere behind me, a blue jay squawks. I sing to Oscar, to the birds and the berries, letting the creatures know I’m around. There’s something to sing about here in the bushes, surrounded by dripping berries and leaves, the repetitive motion of berries in your fingertips and plunking them into the bucket. I’d rather be in this moment than anywhere else. As my grandsons often say, “This is the best day of my life.”
A red huckleberry cream cheese pie and a blueberry cream cheese pie made by Mickey Prescott are examples of what locally picked berries can make. (Vivian Faith Prescott | For the Juneau Empire) A raven’s waterdrop call, as if water is dripping from a faucet, carries across the road from the towering cedar and hemlocks. Ravens probably like the bright red berries too. Red huckleberries are an important food for local songbirds. I’ve seen birds fly out from bushes with these berries in their beaks. Deer love to browse on the berries, leaves, and stems. Red huckleberries are a significant part of the diet of bears, grouse and squirrels, too.
They grow from Southeast Alaska down the coast to as far away as central California.
Red huckleberry iced tea, smoothies, lemonade, tea, and red huckleberry milkshake.
Yesterday’s rain drips like jewels from the berries. I pop a couple of leaves in my mouth and chew them. Indigenous peoples in the Pacific Northwest use red huckleberry leaves for medicine. Boil the bark and make a tea to treat colds. And the leaves and stems can be chopped and used to treat gout. The leaves are also used as a medicinal tea for lowering or modifying modify blood sugar levels.
A handful of fresh red huckleberries, a cup of leaf tea, red huckleberries in oatmeal, in cereal, in water, in yogurt.
After picking for a couple hours, we head back to the truck and load up Huckleberry onto the trailer and head back to fish camp. Next week, we’ll be making our jams and jellies. You can dry red huckleberries by laying them on a cloth and setting them in the sun for a couple of days or use a dehydrator. You can also dry them in the oven with a cracked door on a very low temperature. Dried red huckleberries can be stored like you’d store raisins. Mickey Prescott and Oscar picking red huckleberries. (Vivian Faith Prescott | For the Juneau Empire) They’ll last up to two years in the freezer in a container or bag. But of course, you’ll want to eat them fresh, make something out of them and share them.
They’re rich in vitamin C and fiber, so they’re great nutrients during winter.
Red huckleberry oatmeal bars, oatmeal cookies, red huckleberry and pineapple upside down cake.
Keep in tune with the current season and keep watch on your favorite patch.
Though red huckleberries ripen anywhere from July through September — I’ve picked them the first week of October — picking them later means they’ll be plumper and less tart.
Some people freeze the berries individually on trays before they package them up.
Red huckleberry sorbet, ice-cream, tarts, croissants, fry bread, and red huckleberry donuts.
Wrangell has quite a lot of red huckleberries.
They love our wet coastal climate, but the patches are closely guarded secrets. Many harvesters reserve their knowledge for family and friends.
Take time to scout out the patches and if you find an easy patch make sure it’s not a local elder’s favorite patch. Take an elder with you if you find an accessible patch. Don’t forget to take kids and dogs and a lunch. Berry picking is hard work, but worth it.
Take a friend, relative or elder, with limited abilities, too. Wrangell is fortunate to have areas with accessible picnic tables, parking spots and accessible berries. Your berry-picking companions can help with picking, sorting leaves, keeping watch and telling stories, and even singing to make your presence known.
Remember when you’re out picking red huckleberries not to deplete the whole spot.
After all, red huckleberries are an essential food for brown bears and songbirds. And remember, the best day of your life will be one spent in the bushes dripping with rain, with a dog at your feet and the tart sweet taste of a juicy red huckleberry in your mouth dreaming of a red huckleberry pie.
Red huckleberry pancakes, syrup, scones, and red huckleberry cream-cheese pie.
• Wrangell writer and artist Vivian Faith Prescott writes the column “Planet Alaska” with her daughter, Vivian Mork Yéilk’.
• Wrangell writer and artist Vivian Faith Prescott writes the column “Planet Alaska” with her daughter, Vivian Mork Yéilk’.
