PLYMPTON, Mass. - Some call it a "Bucket List Experience." Mayflower Cranberries in Plympton, Massachusetts offers visitors the opportunity to "Be the Grower" and help out with the annual harvest, in the bog.
"This is something people really sincerely want to do and participate in," says owner Jeff LaFleur, noting that this activity is so popular, so sought after, that he already has a waiting-list for next year. But, patience pays off. Visitors are enamored with this immersive experience.
"I thought it was really fun, I really liked it," says Evelyn Bailey of Florida. "It was something new. You actually stay pretty dry. It wasn’t very cold! You stay warm while you’re working."
Cranberries grow in a dry bog, on a vine. During harvest, the bog is flooded, then a raking machine knocks the berries off the vine until they float on the water's surface. The crimson fruit is corralled before participants don waders and head into the bog.
"They’re using these rakes which are essentially snow rakes," says LaFleur, holding up harvesting tools.
The visitors push the berries towards an underwater tube that sucks them into a truck where they are rinsed and filtered. The cranberry is the number one food crop in Massachusetts.
"This crop has been grown commercially for 200 years and there aren’t many businesses that can say they’ve been around for that amount of time," says LaFleur, noting that Mayflower harvests about 400-thousand pounds of cranberries each year. "It takes 4400 cranberries to make one gallon of cranberry juice!"
The "Be the Grower" program takes place on eight days in October when the farm's landscape is magnificent, alive with fall's colors.
"The typical, quintessential Cape Cod post card, as I call it," says LaFleur. "The red fruit floating on the blue water with the foliage in the background. It really creates such a unique experience."
Mayflower Cranberries also offers an "Adopt a Bog" program and Harvest Viewing Tours. The cost for "Be the grower" is $50 per person for a 2-hour experience. Click here for more information.
