When you hear the word cranberry, what is the first thing that comes to mind? Cranberry juice, dried cranberries, fresh bags of cranberries and the old cranberry sauce on holidays like Thanksgiving. But has anyone thought about where or how this little red fruit appears on the shelves or the produce aisle at your local grocery store? I always knew cranberries were harvested in bogs starting in September/October and many Northwoods towns celebrate the harvest but that’s about it.

So, I did a little research, and this is what I found. Come spring, cranberry seeds are planted in sandy acidic soil and grow into vines. Guess what?  Wisconsin has sandy/acidic soil and close to 250 cranberry farms, making Wisconsin the top producer of cranberries in the United States. When it comes to harvesting these little red gems, there are two methods, WET harvesting and DRY harvesting.

The DRY harvesting cranberries are the fresh ones sold in the produce section and represents only 5% of all cranberries harvested. To reduce bruising, this type of harvesting is done in the morning when it’s cooler and the berries/vines must be totally dry and dry harvesting is labor intensive. A walk behind mechanical picker.

This machine gently combs the berries off the vine and deposits the cranberries on to a conveyer into burlap bags in the back of the machine. Once the bag is full, it’s taken off the machine, placed on the ground and a new burlap bag is applied. To prevent crushing the berries, some farmers will use shallow wood or plastic containers. Then those are cleaned, sorted and stored in a cool dry place.

The WET harvesting is less labor intensive and thanks to modern equipment this farming technique is more efficient because a larger quantity can be harvested in a shorter period of time. When the cranberries are ripe, the bog they grow in is flooded with 8 to 12 inches of water and current from rotating paddles causes berries to loosen from the vines. Once the cranberries are detached, they float to the surface because of an internal air pocket and are easily accessible.

When the red berries are floating on top of the water, they are corralled using floating barriers and removed by either scooping or vacuumed into trucks before being processed. This is when the cranberries are cleaned, graded and sorted based on size and quality. Now we all know a little more about cranberries being harvested than just when, where and towns celebrating this fruit.

Oh, and they contain antioxidants that are healthy and are a great source of vitamins C & E.