BLUEBERRIES BECKON PERSNICKETY PICKERS

"The nicest privy in Bollinger County" is what Linda Whitener says of the outhouse near the log cabin at Trace Creek Blues. It's decorated with wallpaper, curtains and stained glass.

A quarter-acre pond was built to supply irrigation to the dozens of rows of blueberry bushes. Two swimming pool filters filled with sand remove algae and soil particles from the water before it is pumped uphill to the berry patches.

Rows of blueberry bushes are laden with berries starting to ripen. These 700 bushes were planted in 1988. On the hill is a log cabin built by Henry Whitener.

The blueberries at Trace Creek Blues, a berry farm near Glen Allen in Bollinger County, bloomed a bit early this year. But Henry and Linda Whitener aren't singing the blues.

"They'll be ready to pick in early June," said Linda Whitener of the berries that abound on about 1,600 bushes near the Whiteners' home off County Road 828 and Highway DD. Right now, the budding berries are besieged by bumble bees, which are politely pollinating.

"The first ripe berries will be in four or five weeks," she said. "And the bushes will produce for about a month. A good picker can pick about 10 pounds in an hour."

The Whiteners live on 160 acres they bought nine years ago. The land was bought with the intention of raising blueberries on much of it. To learn how to raise blueberries, they read brochures provided by the local University Extension agent, and they started attending Small Fruit Growers Association conferences in Springfield.

"The land hadn't been cleared in maybe 15 years," said Henry Whitener. "I cleared it and built up the soil for a few years by growing green manure crops like buckwheat. I'd turn the crops under each year."

Since blueberries require a lot of water -- a bush can drink a gallon a day -- a quarter-acre pond was built and a seepage irrigation system laid under mounds of mulch.

"Then one day we called in the neighbors and had a planting party," said Whitener. "We planted about 700 bushes ... that was in November of 1988."

The bushes were bought in Arkansas and were about 6 inches tall. The following year another 900 bushes were planted in a second berry patch.

For the first couple of years the Whiteners picked the blooms off the bushes in the spring. That was to help the bushes get established. Now established, the berry bushes are kicking out the jam.

Trace Creek Blues -- so named because Trace Creek runs behind the property and Blues means blueberries -- is basically a pick-your-own operation, although the Whiteners hire people to pick berries for those who just want to buy them, at $1.15 a pound.

"Most of the picking will last until mid-July," said Linda Whitener, holding a one-gallon bucket filled with a plastic bag that holds between 5 and 6 pounds of fresh berries. "People can fill the bag, tie it, take it home and put it in the freezer until it's needed.

"We don't spray the bushes with anything so you can eat them any time." The bushes are, however, fertilized with Urea, a high-nitrogen soil supplement added to the mulch.

The Whiteners grow three varieties of blueberries -- collins, blue ray and blue crop. Each has a slightly different taste and each ripens at different times. Once plump, a batch of berries will cause a branch to droop toward the ground.

"That's when you just roll them off your thumb into the bucket," said Linda Whitener, stroking baby berries as bumble bees buzz by.

Adds her husband: "I keep the bushes trimmed. People don't want to pick anything lower than their knees or higher than their shoulders."

A bush is in its producing prime when the branches are three, four and five years old. After five years, a branch gradually loses its viability. But every year new shoots appear and as they mature the older branches are cut off. The thinning out also serves to let sunlight and air in to where the berries are ripening.

Growing blueberries is not a carefree endeavor, says Henry Whitener, who also does concrete work and has a portable sawmill. Birds and deer are a nuisance -- sometimes a devastation.

"We lost almost the whole crop to birds three years ago," he said, sitting on the porch of a log cabin that serves as an office during the picking season, motioning to a nearby row of blueberry bushes. "I hate birds, they love blueberries.

"Robins are the number one culprit. Putting netting over the patches is the only sure way to keep them out, but that would make the place look like a greenhouse ... it'd be a lot of work."

Other ways of keeping birds at bay include stretching tape across the patches, floating big balloons between bushes, setting off explosive devices like carbide cannons and installing electronic scare sirens.

"I haven't tried any of those things yet," said Whitener, "I'm told the electronic scare devices work best. But they're noisy -- they sound like someone strangling an old robin."

Linda Whitener, who teaches remedial math at Woodlawn School in Marble Hill, says deer have been a problem. They've eaten buds and blossoms. This year, however, an electric fence has helped to keep them at bay.

The Whiteners are starting to dabble in black berries, red and black raspberries and gooseberries. If they grow well, they might also become "pickable."

Bread and breakfast

The log cabin that serves as the office will also be a bed and breakfast this year. After three years of work, Henry finished the cabin five years ago.

Measuring 12-by-24 with a porch that measures the same, the cabin was built with 36 hand-hewn pine logs.

"It's always been a boyhood dream to build a log cabin," said Henry Whitener, scooting a calico cat off a table on the porch. "I got me a broad axe and said, 'By golly, if they built them before, I can do it now.'"

Logs were hewed in the evenings while rocks were gathered for the foundation and a fireplace. Concrete is the mortar that holds it all together. Much of the roof is made of shake shingles Whitener split.

The cabin is furnished with antiques; a bear skin hangs on a wall. A quilt covers a bed in one corner and there's room in the loft for another bed.

Linda Whitener says berry pickers have often suggested the cabin be turned into a bed and breakfast.

"So the idea's been cooking in our minds ... we decided to do it this spring."

In keeping with its rustic appearance, the cabin has no electricity or running water. Water for the "bowl and pitcher plumbing" is available in a large jug on the porch. A large loom nearby also adds to the down-home atmosphere.

Situated on a hill graced by a fairly steady breeze, the cabin is near the two berry patches and within view of the pond. A picnic table and bar-be-cue pit are in a side yard.

The outhouse, says Linda Whitener, "is the nicest privy in Bollinger County." It has a linoleum floor, wallpaper, windows with curtains and stained glass. A white gravel walk near a patch of wild flowers leads to the one-seater.

The bed and breakfast is available through October for between $50 and $65 a night. Guests are treated to an evening dessert of blueberry cobbler and a full breakfast the next morning.

"I'll bring the breakfast to the guests, put it on the porch, ring the dinner bell and disappear," said Whitener.

Trace Creek Blues is open from 7 a.m. until 7 p.m. every day but Sunday and Wednesday. Visitors are often greeted by a host of cats and two dalmations, Fritzi and her daughter, Shiner.