Nebraskaland

46 NEBRASKAland • AUGUST-SEPTEMBER 2015 diminutive shrub of sandy soils. A tree of rich woodlands, the black cherry (P. serotina) grows only in southeastern Nebraska. Its fruits, small, dark purple to black and bitter, are relished by birds. A Harvest of Plums "Plumming expeditions innumerable" have occurred in Nebraska beginning with Native Americans who, living on the fruit-meager Plains, eagerly awaited the fall harvest. The naturalist George Bird Grinnell wrote, "Near the [Cheyenne] camps the wild plums seldom ripen because the children pick and eat them green; but in places at a distance many plums were gathered by the women, and were stoned, dried in the sun, and kept for winter. When the ripe plums thus dried were cooked by boiling, they became almost like cooked fresh plums." The Pawnees reportedly dried them unpitted. Like the Cheyenne children, I, too, anticipate the plumming season, periodically biking to thickets on the outskirts of Aurora and giving the reddest plums the bite test for ripeness. If juicy and sweet I'll return with a bucket. I've become a serious plum gatherer only recently, since my mother-in-law, Lucille Kostel of Wagner, South Dakota, taught me the art of fruit canning. My largest seasonal plum harvest to-date has been about 15 to 20 gallons, a pittance compared to that of Sherri Seifer, owner of Rafter 7S Jellies, a business located on her families' Sandhills Ranch north of Paxton. The name Rafter 7S comes from their ranch's cattle brand. "Some years I'll harvest over 600 pounds of wild plums for the making of jams, jellies and syrup," Siefer said. Wild plum jelly is her second best seller, topped only by chokecherry jelly. "Last year was a good year, the plums were so plump and juicy they were splitting,"Siefer said. The picking crew consists of herself and whichever of her three college-aged children is home and willing to help. Seifer usually picks within 30 miles of home, but will range as far as 60 miles when plums are scarce, making several return trips to fruit-laden thickets over the harvest season. Late spring frosts are Seifer's nemesis, as hers is a business sensitive to the whims of nature. She said there are usually some plums every year, but good crops come about one out of three years. In these years, she will harvest large quantities, freezing many plums unpitted for future lean harvests; the frozen fruits stay good for several years. Seifer sells her jellies and syrups online, at farmers markets and at GROW Nebraska stores. "They are popular because I make them the old-fashioned way, one small, hand-stirred batch at a time," Siefer said. "Customers say our jellies remind them of those their grandma used to make." My mother-in-law learned how to make plum preserves from her grandmother. While some people use only the pulp or juice for jam and jelly, Lucille, raised on a farm where nothing was wasted, makes use of the PLUMS BY THE BUCKET lay on the porch to ripen. The author's mother-in-law Lucille Kostel and her daughter Grace proudly pose with their harvest.

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