Edom’s ‘you-pick’ farm offers summer fun for all

Published 8:09 pm Sunday, June 14, 2015

EDOM — Springtime surrendered — for three days, at least. The late March freeze in 2014 included three days of temperatures below 20 degrees. And that was the end of Blueberry Hill Farms’ berry crop for the year.

“We just didn’t have a season,” explains Sherri Arena, who owns the “you-pick” farm with her husband, Chuck. “Our berries froze — all of them. Blueberries, blackberries. We’re not Wal-Mart, we don’t have suppliers; we’re small farmers. We lost everything we grew that year.”

But now, berries are bursting on the bushes and vines, and Blueberry Hill Farms is open for business. The heavy rains that lifted the multi-year drought in Texas were a boon to the berries, and the Arenas expect a bumper crop.

“The rains slowed the ripening some, but this week’s sunshine took care of all that,” she said last week. “The berries are ripening now, just this week. Just in time.”

On a busy Wednesday — the first of the season — there were baskets of berries coming into the small store, and cups of blueberry yogurt going out to the covered patio.

The Blueberry Hill’s season starts now and lasts until the end of July.

“We’ll see 4,000 to 5,000 people,” Mrs. Arena said. “We’re already getting about 4,000 hits on our website every week. A lot of these will be people who came here as kids, with parents and grandparents. Now they’re bringing their own children. That means a lot to us.”

Blueberry Hill Farms, at 10268 Farm-to-Market Road 314 in Edom, is one of the first blueberry operations in East Texas, and it’s always been family-owned. It was started in 1982 by Bob and Marilyn Rogers; they sold it in 1999 to the Arenas. They’ve expanded it some; they added some buildings and some more acreage.

The U-pick portion of the business is about 10 acres of blueberry bushes, which can produce anywhere from 40,000 to 100,000 pounds a year. There also are blackberry vines. Another 43 acres is planted, but the Arenas hire pickers to work that portion, for all of the berry-themed products the store offers.

The most popular item is the preserves.

“We used to make the preserves ourselves,” Mrs. Arena said. “But we sold out the first winter’s work in about a week. We had to scale up.”

They now have a contractor who helps produce up to 800 cases of the preserves, jams and even fruit-flavored barbecue sauces the store sells.

The store also includes a bakery, with the most requested item being the blueberry cream pie.

The store is staffed by teens, several of whom are working there for a second and third summer.

“This started as kind of a hobby, something to keep our kids out of trouble,” Mrs. Arena said. “We own a company in Dallas, but we would come out here with our three daughters.”

Those daughters worked in the fields and in the store, but they’re grown now. One is a real estate agent in Dallas, one is an elementary school teacher in New York City, and one attends college. But they’ll all be in town for the farm’s biggest weekend, July 4.

On that weekend, Chuck Arena said he’ll have workers directing traffic and helping people park. But even a record July 4 weekend will only go to help defray the costs of last year’s freeze.

“It will take two years to recoup from last year,” he said. “But that’s the life of a farmer.”

Still, farming is the easy part, Arena said.

“The hard part is also being your own plumber and electrician and carpenter. I’m the kind of person who will always try to fix something myself before calling someone in. That’s not always the smartest thing. Sometimes I make it worse. But it’s part of the job.”

He’s not really complaining — in fact, the couple is looking to sell its telecom business in Dallas. And he’s looking for ways to expand in Edom and East Texas.

“This is already much bigger than we ever thought it would be,” he said.

For now, though, he’s just happy the weather is cooperating. He didn’t even mind the constant rains throughout the spring.

“When we irrigate, we draw from the Wilcox Aquifer, which is good, good water,” he said. “But nothing compares to rain. It’s what we needed.”

Twitter: @tmt_roy

BOX: IF YOU GO

Open: Every day through July 31, including July 4

Hours: 7 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Cost: Blueberries, U-pick, $2.65/pound; blackberries, $3/pound

Wear: Hats, closed-toe shoes, sunscreen, sunglasses

Bring: A cooler to bring your berries home

Don’t bring: Your pets

Information: www.blueberryhillfarms.com