Page 12 - Flathead Beacon // 7.29.15

NEWS
Uncertain Huckleberry Harvest
Hastened by heat and drought, the season is off to an early but weak start
BY CLARE MENZEL OF THE BEACON
If you find yourself on Big Mountain
this weekend, you might keep an eye out for huckleberries. Usually, the popular purple-blue berries don’t start popping on the mountain until much later—some people remember seeing ripe berries there in October last year—but pickers are reporting that this season is nothing like its predecessor.
“Last year was incredible, and this one is definitely not as good,” said Ed Spring- man, with the Huckleberry Haven in Evergreen.
“We’re about a month to three weeks ahead of time,” said Flathead National Forest Botanist Chantelle DeLay. “The season started earlier, and expectations are that it’s not going to be as great of a crop as we’ve seen in the past due to lack
of rain and hot days.”
Delay said this season’s berries likely
won’t be plentiful because plants at lower elevations may not have had the chance to produce flowers before June’s drought hit. She also predicts that they won’t be very plump.
“Huckleberries? There are no huck- leberries,” said Greg Sorenson, a picker from Columbia Falls. “The hot weather has killed the crop. When you find them, they’re hard and there’s no juice. I won’t sell a single huckleberry. They’re too rare this year.”
The crop may be thin, but Laurie Carpy, the manager of the Huckleberry Patch in Hungry Horse, said there must be berries out there because pickers still come through her door with full barrels almost every day.
Besides, there is enough time for
rainfall to turn the season around. “Huckleberries are so resilient,” said Will Hammerquist, owner of the Pole- bridge Mercantile, which is famous for its huckleberry bear claws. “Hopefully we’ll get some rain and there’ll be enough for
everybody.”
Though the pickers have been asking
for up to 10 percent more pay due to scar- city, as Hammerquist reports, businesses like the Mercantile typically purchase their berries for use in the following sea- son, so it’s unlikely that a poor harvest would effect prices of huckleberry prod- ucts this summer.
“Huckleberries are a delicacy,” Ham- merquist said. “And when we have a bumper crop like last year, we take that for granted. We’re pretty fortunate to have them in our world.”
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Huckleberries along the trail to Sixmile Peak. BEACON FILE PHOTO
Glacier Restaurant Group Raises Over $30K for Local Charities Montanans embrace Round It Up program
BY CLARE MENZEL OF THE BEACON
Patrons of six restaurants in the Flat-
head Valley might have noticed some- thing different on their bills in the last few months. Now, there’s a third line down at the bottom, one between the space for entering a tip and calculating the final payment. That’s the Round It Up line.
Round It Up is a nationwide program that facilitates the movement of “change” from credit card purchases at restau- rants to local charities and nonprofits.
When signing for the bill, customers are presented with the opportunity to round up their payment. For example, someone with a total of $19.80 might round up and pay $20. Those additional
20 cents are considered charitable dol- lars and get earmarked for donation.
“We’re getting very positive feedback,” said Ryan Fuller, the director of opera- tions of Glacier Restaurant Group, the organization that oversees MacKenzie River Pizza and Ciao Mambo franchises in the valley, as well as The Craggy Range Bar & Grill and Latitude 48.
Servers do not mention the line, and only one or two customers have men- tioned feeling pressured by the soft ask. Many more of them choose to donate, often offering an extra dollar or two.
“I love everything about it [Round It Up],” said Brad Griffin, the executive director of Montana Retail and Restau- rant Association. “It’s the modern-day version of the change jar you’d find on
the cash register counter. Montanans are very generous people, and it’s proved to be an extremely effective way to raise money.”
When Griffin pitched the program at a mid-2014 MRRA meeting, Fuller fell in love with the idea, too, and brought it straight home to Whitefish.
“Ryan was the first to jump on board,” Griffin said. “It was like going 0 to 60 in two seconds—well, it was like going 0 to 26 in two seconds.” Before the end of the year, Round It Up lines started appearing on the bills of 26 of GRG’s restaurants.
So far, GRG restaurants across the state have raised $35,400 in Round It Up donations. No Kid Hungry and ProStart are the current recipients of this support.
No Kid Hungry, one of Gov. Steve
Bullock’s initiatives, provides healthy school breakfasts as well as summer and after-school meals. ProStart, a Mon- tana Restaurant Association Program, teaches students about the restaurant business and offers instruction in culi- nary skills.
“Their energy, excitement, and com- mitment has been really, really impact- ful,” said Michelle McCarthy, Round It Up America’s chief operational officer. “There is a huge population of folks in Montana committed to helping.”
And that population is growing. Cur- rently, five more Montanan restaurants are in the process of enrolling.
“The charities are over-the-moon excited,” Fuller said.
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JULY 29, 2015 // FLATHEADBEACON.COM