Gross
I’ve been waiting anxiously for my ladden blackcurrant bush to get enough heat for the currants to ripen for picking, and with the recent heat blast I was in luck. So this weekend I set out to pick pounds and pounds of the suckers to start various jelly, jam and cordial preserving projects. I even bought a kitchen scale. Then the ick happened: after mashing up two pounds of currants to make a pulp for a cordial I started to see little worms squirmming around my jar. Worms that had not been there when I thoroughly washed and stemmed the currants. I boldly picked them out and carried on. More more worms. My stomach was starting to turn. A quick session of internet research uncovered this: Currant Fruit Fly. Apparently they lay their eggs (worms) inside the berries. Ugh.
So now I’m faced with pounds (probably 15 or 20) of wormy currants, and some major work on my part if I want to stop this from happening next year. From all I’ve read I’ll need to remove ever single berry from the bush and ground and dispose of them. Blah.
If anyone has some magic wand for me, I’m all ears.
June 27th, 2006 at 10:49 am
oh gross. i wonder if i should worry about my blackberry bushes. ick.
June 27th, 2006 at 11:23 am
I don’t think it afflicts blackberries. It seems to be a currant-specific thing.
June 27th, 2006 at 2:27 pm
Yuck!! Thanks for the info though, I had never heard of that before. Will make me think twice before popping a currant from mine into my mouth before checking.
June 28th, 2006 at 8:31 am
That’s a real drag Emira and a lot of work to overturn. But worth it… blackcurrants…
April 24th, 2007 at 10:23 pm
As gross as it may sound, I say just eat ‘em worms and all, especially if yr going to cook the berries anyway. Just a little more protein right? If you can’t beat ‘em eat ‘em. As long as you’re sure they won’t make you sick.
Good luck though.
May 29th, 2007 at 2:48 pm
try freezing the berries before the buggars hatch. then all you have is tiny eggs. you’ll never know they’re there. i’m a beekeeper and there are moths that like eating beeswax. very commom practice is to freeze the honeycomb for 24hrs to kill any eggs before packaging. maybe it would work for currants too?? i dunno. prolly worth a try tho.