More Raspberries

Since the raspberry season started about a week ago, it has been raining on and off, and I haven't been out much to pick more.  So today when it cleared and I went out, I was sad to see many berries have already gone mouldy.  But the ones which hadn't sure made it worth my while :

It's interesting that this year, the red berries seem to have overtaken the golden ones.  I'm pretty sure last year, the golden berries were a higher proportion than they are this year.  But then again, maybe I'm thinking of the fall crop, in which the golden berries are very large and sweet (see this post from Sept 2011).

I had a little adventure in the raspberry patch last week, a couple days after my first raspberry post.  I was going to pick some berries, and discovered a wasp nest in the branches.  It was already a couple inches across.  I am a "live and let live" person as much as possible, but that would not end well for everyone involved.  

At first, I tried just cutting the 3 branches which it was suspended from, in hope that it would fall to the ground, and the wasps would abandon it.  But when I clipped the branches (3 black wasps flew out as I was clipping it!), it fell a bit and got suspended in some other branches.  Then I decided to shower it with water, to discourage the wasps, but that didn't seem to work.  They seemed a bit agitated, but continued to fly in and out of the nest.  So finally I realized that I could blast it hard with the water, and break the nest apart.  Hopefully that is the end of that, and the wasps pick a much more suitable location for their next nest.  I will need to be vigilant, in case they try to rebuild there.