Berry good!

Now that I'm no longer spending my nights and weekends getting my papers ready, I've once again got time and motivation to dash off silly projects like this Venn diagram comparing things we call berries, and things which are berries according to botanists:

I got the idea for this upon learning this weekend that pumpkins are actually giant berries, botanically speaking. I already knew raspberries and blackberries weren't berries, so I got curious about just how large the overlap is. This is by no means a comprehensive image; I listed everything I could think of with “berry” in the name, then looked at the Wikipedia page on berries for more such things and examples of things that were berries botanically. There are definitely more things that fall into the bottom circle, I'm sure; I left a few controversial ones out, like avocados, because there's apparently some disagreement about whether they're actually berries or not.

On the whole, I was actually slightly surprised at how many things fell into the intersection of the diagram. I was expecting more entries in the top circle, but it looks like possibly a majority of things with “berry” in the name are actually berries, botanically speaking. Though there could very well be more things called berries than I could think of, so if you think of any please leave a comment!

A few things in the bottom circle also surprised me; like, I can see how tomatoes and grapes could be berries, they're similar enough in form to things like blueberries or cranberries that it makes sense. But pumpkins? Eggplants? Bananas?? Bananas definitely surprised me. Guess I've got a fun bit of party trivia for the future.

And speaking of strawberries (which are actually “accessory fruits”), I had my first one from my Farmstand! They're a bit on the slower side to grow (compared to, say, lettuce), since I started the plant at the start of January, but the strawberry I had was deliciously sweet. There's another red one and a few still green that are coming along, so I'm looking forward to having some more perhaps later this week or the next. I'll probably have some more news on the indoor farming front around that time as well. A hui hou!