Searching High and Loganberry
Do you know what this berry is all about?
Howdy! It’s Joey, back with more Fun Fact Friyay, the newsletter for curious people. This time, we’re having a berry good day.
The loganberry, a combination of European blackberries and American raspberries, was created by accident.
If you’re a culinary expert, you may already be aware of this fact. Yet, as an eating expert, I had no idea!
In 1881, a Californian judge and plant enthusiast named James Harvey Logan was doing a lil’ horticulturin’ in his backyard. He was displeased with the blackberries on the market and thought if he paired two of them together, he could create a Super Blackberry (name TBD).
One of those types of blackberries was the Aughinbaugh Pacific Blackberry, a delightfully fun name to say. Go ahead and try it; no one’s listening. And if they are, you’ll teach them a new word.
But that Aughinbaugh was planted too close to a vine of Red Antwerp Raspberries, and lo and behold, Logan had himself 50 seedlings that he planted in the ground.
He gathered those cross-pollinated seedlings and plopped ‘em back into the Earth. Some plants grew into the Mammoth Blackberry (a better name than Super Blackberry), and one became this blackberry/raspberry hybrid.
Because it was a rule in the 1800s that you had to name an invention after yourself, Logan already had the moniker for this new fruit: the loganberry.
Loganberries are sturdier and more resistant to disease than a lot of other berries, but farmers tend to avoid them because they’re often obscured by thorns. If you’ve ever pricked your hand on something, you know that’s no picnic. Now, imagine doing that dozens of times in a row. Yowch.
However, if you ever find yourself with a bout of scurvy (or are worried about the potential of that), the British Navy used to go heavy on the loganberries to prevent that ailment. That’s a pretty good superpower.
The loganberry is also one of the berries that make up the boysenberry, a combination of FOUR different berries. Boysenberries are made up of loganberry, the European blackberry, European raspberry, and American dewberry.
Now go eat some berries while you bury a DVD set of Barry. And that’s probably enough wordplay for the rest of the month.
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