State Still Looking For Leaseholders To Harvest 'Red October' At Double Trouble State Park Bogs

There was a time when paid pickers prowled the dry cranberry bogs at Double Trouble each September and October, trying to harvest as many berries as they could to make as much money as they could.

They lived in bunkhouses and shopped at the store in the historic village. The crimson berries were sorted in the big white sorting building, often by local women from Bayville looking to make some extra money.

Those days are long gone. When the Crabbe family sold its legacy to the state of New Jersey back in 1964, the days of dry harvesting were over. Most growers moved onto the the wet harvest, where the bogs were flooded and berries were corralled my men and machines.

But unless leaseholders step up soon, it looks like yet another year at Double Trouble State Park will pass without a cranberry harvest.

"We haven’t given up looking for leaseholders for the bogs at Double Trouble and elsewhere on state lands," Considine said. "In fact, we are preparing a request for expression of interest for potential leaseholders. The interest remains to be seen."

The last harvest was in 2012, when Deptford-based Honest Berries stepped up. But shortly after the company started, Superstorm Sandy roared into Bayville and cut the harvest short.

By the winter of 2013, the crimson berries - swept out of the bogs by Sandy - studded the snow off in the woods.

The state Department of Environmental Protection had hoped Honest Berries or another leaseholder would step up for the fall harvests of 2013, 2014, 2015 and 2016. But that didn’t happen.

Park staff drained the historic bogs in mid-May this year, once there was no longer any danger of overnight frost, he said.

"We have done some maintenance to the bogs, as much as a small staff can do," Considine said.

That includes maintaining the water supply in the bogs and flooding them for the winter after the vines have gone dormant to comply with the Double Trouble's water use certificate.

Cranberries have a 16-month growing cycle, so winter flooding helps protect the buds for the next season's crop from extreme cold.

And years of no weeding, fertilization and spraying have taken their toll on the bogs, which are nearly 100 years old, Daniel Crabbe, founder Edward Crabbe's grandson.

“It’s a shame,” he said back in 2014. "They are letting it go."

The Gowdy bog is now a patchwork of weeds and cranberry plants. And the weeds are winning.

Image: Patricia A. Miller - the last harvest in 2012.