No 'Red October' At Double Trouble State Park This Fall

BERKELEY TOWNSHIP, NJ - By late October, the cranberries in the bogs at Double Trouble State Park should have turned a rich crimson, ready for the thresher.

But the Gowdy bog, the bog nearest to the historic cranberry sorting house, has slowly been transformed over the past few years. Some cranberry vines are still there, studded with pockets of scarlet berries, but they are being choked out by buff-colored, foot-high weeds.

The last harvest at Double Trouble was in October 2012, by Deptford-based Honest Berries. But it was cut short after Superstorm Sandy slammed into the park. The 2013 harvest was canceled due to weather conditions.

Since then, the state of New Jersey has been unable to attract any leaseholders who used to harvest the bogs, although a spokesperson for the state Department of Environmental Protection said the agency is still working on it.

The DEP’s Office of Leases and Concessions is preparing a draft Request For Expression of Interest to identify historic features of the bogs and provide better details for potential leaseholders, said Caryn Shinkse.

The draft document will then be reviewed by the state Attorney General's office, then released to the public, hopefully by next January, she said.

But cranberry bogs need maintenance - pruning, weeding, sanding and planting new vines. And that apparently hasn't been done in some time.

The Double Trouble cranberry industry was born when Edward Crabbe began planting cranberry vines more than a century ago, after he had harvested Atlantic white cedars. The Crabbe family ran a productive cranberry business for 60 years. They eventually sold the property to the state in 1964.

The family had a financial and emotional relationship with Double Trouble, Daniel Crabbe, Edward Crabbe's grandson said in a presentation to the Berkeley Township Historical Society. A family graveyard is located in a remote area of the park.

Crabbe said in an interview several years ago the Double Trouble bogs need to be maintained so sunlight can hit the cranberry plants. The bogs have to be sanded, too and weeds mowed down.

“It’s a shame,” he said then. “They are letting it go.”

Bog maintenance requires machinery the state does not own, former DEP spokesman Bob Considine has said.

Daniel Crabbe has said he understands that money is the issue. But that doesn’t make it any easier to see the bogs his family cultivated for so long go back to nature.

“The longer it goes, the harder it is to get them back,” Crabbe said.

It looks like the weeds are winning.

Photos: Patricia A. Miller