The elderberry trees I planted last year have thrived. They may be doing so well as to require some rigorous monitoring and pruning to keep them from overtaking my yard. Sorry kids, when you inherit the house, the first thing you will have to deal with will be all the feral elderberry. I harvested some of the flowers to make elderflower tea, but I'd rather wait to see what I can do with the berries. They won't be ready until the end of the summer. I have four elderberry bushes, but how many berries I get will depend upon how dutiful the birds are at foraging. I dug out my blackberry this year because the birds would get to them before I could. However, my blackberry were not producing very well because the very sunny location I planted them required more watering than I was willing to do. I wasn't interested in a making such a resource intensive berry. The elderberry so far seems much more prolific, although the preparation of the berries to remove the arsenic compounds may make it more work than picking and eating a blackberry.
