Canning supplies: Still a problem

Once in a while I dip into the issue of canning supply shortages, wondering what the status is. I've noticed there seems to be some canning jars in local grocery stores again, though lids still seem to be missing. But what's going on in the wider world?

So this morning I got onto the Lehman's website (which is kind of my "indicator" source) to see what's up. Looks like supplies are still sold out. Here's the announcement for regular-mouth canning jars:

Underneath the entry is the note: "Due to high demand, the vendor has been sending supply of styles that vary. We are sorry for the inconvenience, but we cannot guarantee a particular style."

Same thing for all jar sizes, such as wide-mouth quart.

Canning lids, of course, are completely gone. I've always kicked myself for not getting a few shipments of bulk lids when they were available. Despite mostly using Tattlers, I like having disposable lids as well.

Lehmans has been hammering at the doors of their suppliers, to no avail:

Reusable lids still seem to be in stock, which was nice to see (although the reviews indicate some people aren't familiar with how to use them).

Next, I checked pressure canners. As you might have guessed, none are available. Here's a mid-range All-American canner:

(A quick check on the All American Canner website confirms the lack of availability.)

I checked in with Glenda Lehman Ervin, VP of Marketing, to get her take on the situation. She wrote back and said:

"Yes, canning supplies are very difficult to get, as are certain Lodge cast iron products, wood cook stoves and Berkey water filters.

We do have stock of canned meat now, as well as Aladdin lamp oil and several key gardening products, which were back ordered.

Each week we get lots of product in, but it turns right around as we fill back orders and supply pent-up demand.

We ask customers to please be patient – we are working on increasing our communication on the status of back orders.  We do recommend placing an order to reserve your place in line!"

This is an immensely frustrating situation for retailers. Remember, they can't sell what they can't get.

What has been your experiences, dear readers? Do you have any suggestions for those looking for canning supplies?

SCORE!!!!

I was low on canning jars. And I mean really low. I was actually reduced to buying new jars (unheard of!), but I have been doing lots of canning lately and, well, I was low on jars.

I've scoured every thrift store I could find, but Fall is not the best time to search thrift stores for canning jars -- they're usually sold out.

I tried searching Craig's List and the Nickel's Worth and similar sources, but I found more people looking for jars than were selling them. Besides, our region is so widespread and far-flung that any available jars were likely to be a two or three hour drive (one way) distant.

New jars range anywhere from $9 to $14/dozen, so buying new jars is impractical for someone who cans on the scale I do. But what else could I do? I needed jars.

My youngest brother, bless his heart, sent me $50 for my 50th birthday. I kept the money in the card and earmarked it for canning jars, figuring I could buy about five dozen pint jars (with a bit of change left over) for this amount.

But then I had an idea. Putting a "wanted" ad in any regional ad source was counterproductive. But what about putting an ad in our local once-a-week newspaper? Duh, why didn't I think of that sooner?

So I did.

My hope is I'd find an older woman who was past her canning years who might be willing to give up her jars for an affordable price.

Well, it worked. BIG TIME.

I got a call from a woman named Barbara who lives in the next town over, who said she had "lots" of jars in her basement. I tentatively asked how much she was willing to sell them for, figuring my top price would be $6/dozen (any higher, and I might as well buy them new). But when she hesitantly said, "$2 a dozen?" (as if that was too much to ask!), it was all I could do from gasping. SCORE!!

Barbara said she was glad to get rid of them, and she would pull all the jars out of her basement and stack them on the front porch for me. I combined a trip into town with Older Daughter's evening Venture Scouts meeting. It was a little hard to find Barbara's place on a dark rainy evening, but I finally did. And look what I saw!

Barbara showed me her tally: twenty dozen jars. For $2/dozen. SCORE!!

I even got change for my $50 bill. Hmmm, what shall I do with this money?

I loaded the car to groaning and rattled my way home. I brought them into the house the next morning and spread everything out to see what I had (and let me tell you, I felt like a kid at Christmas). From the bits of old newspapers used to line some of the boxes, I gather these jars haven't been used since about 1998. No wonder she was anxious to get rid of them.

It took me a couple of hours to re-box everything into old empty canning-jar boxes I had stored away, which also gave me a chance to more accurately inventory and/or label everything.

Final tally: eight dozen quarts, nine dozen pints...

...and three dozen miscellaneous smaller (i.e. jelly) jars. SCORE!!

Rather miraculously, I managed to squeeze ALL the boxes of empty jars into my canning closet.

Twenty dozen new jars. That should last me awhile, don'cha think? I have to thank the Barbara's of the world for passing on their treasures to a younger generation. Maybe someday, when I'm a lot older, I'll do the same.

Altogether now: SCORE!!!!!!!

Chicken pix...

Since we now have a completed canning closet, I finally had a chance to take my excess canning jars out of the barn and get them inventoried and stored in the house.  - only to find chickens using them as roosts.

Oh well, nothing a little soap and water won't fix.

Handing out nuggets of gold...

It's funny how blessings happen unexpectedly.

As usual, I've been running short on canning jars. I've been making it a policy to check every thrift store we enter for any jars, and have picked up about three dozen quarts so far.

Then early this week, a lady from our church named Daina called. She had a friend who was helping an elderly woman clean out the junk in her home prior to moving into a retirement center. The friend had found some gallon jars. Did I want them?

You bet! Daina said she'd bring them to church with her on Sunday.

Well, she called later in the week and warned me there were more jars than she anticipated. In fact, I might not be able to fit them all into our car in one trip. No problem, we could leave the excess jars at church and pick them up later.

So this morning (Sunday) as I walked into church, Daina amended her story once more. "Did you look in the back of my truck?" she asked.

"No, why?" I replied.

"There aren't too many gallon jars after all..." she began.

I started to make noises of disappointment when she added, "...but there are a lot of pint and quart jars. Is that okay?"

I stared at her. Okay? Did she just ask if that was OKAY?? It was all I could do to keep from jumping up and down!

We went out and looked in the back of her pickup, and my jaw dropped. It was packed, absolutely packed, with canning jars of all sizes!

And Daina didn't want them. I know this because I asked over and over again, "Are you SURE you don't want them?" But, being a bit older as well as single, she was scaling back and simply wasn't canning like she used to, so she honestly didn't want them.

So there they were, dozens of dusty dirty jars filled with old dead spiders, gleaming in the morning sunshine like nuggets of gold. And she was giving them to me FREE! I felt guilty, like I was taking advantage of someone somehow.



At home, I unloaded them into the barn for the time being, and took a tally. Five gallon jars, six half-gallon jars, 86 quarts, 83 pints. WOW!!

What a total and complete blessing!

Canning closet

Well, I did it. After several years of having my canning jars, rings, and lids scattered hither and yon, I finally got everything consolidated and (more or less) in one place.

Our house is kind of a strange house. It used to be a three-unit apartment, believe it or not, so when we first moved in we had three bathrooms and three kitchens. One of each was for the main apartment, but the other two sets of facilities were so small as to be functionally useless, so we gutted them.

Kind of. The little bathroom we call our "front room bathroom" no longer has working plumbing, but all the facilities are still in place. Eventually we will totally gut this space and transform it into my canning storage.

For the time being, all my full canning jars are being stored in our younger daughter's closet (which is this weird overly large walk-in space), but the unused jars and other paraphernalia were just put wherever there was room.

But last week I completely emptied out the front room bathroom, organized my jars into quarts, pints, and odd sizes, separated out my wide-mouthed and small-mouthed rings, and put my wide-mouth and small-mouth lids in separate boxes. Whoo-hoo!

Here are my boxes of canning rings stacked on the toilet. Large-mouth rings on the tank, small-mouth on the seat. And no, I don't know how I got all these rings. I certainly have never purchased any rings separately. I think they breed in the dead of night or while we're away.


My collection of wide-mouth lids...


And small-mouth lids.


This is my stack of pint jars. I tried to get a picture of my stacks of quart jars but the space was too narrow and I couldn't "fit" them in the camera view because they're stacked in the shower stall.


Some of the 3.5 gallon bakery buckets we get from a grocery store bakery ($2/each). These buckets are terrific - airtight and sturdy. I store our five-gallon buckets elsewhere, but these buckets hold the stuff I use on a more frequent basis - sugar, flour, rice, that kind of thing.

Windfall. Absolute WINDFALL.

I've been facing a chronic shortage of canning jars. I actually went so far as to buy five dozen new ones, something I never do, but I needed them. I'm lucky to find two or three single jars at a time in thrift stores, and most of the time I find none.

Still, I inquire every time...and this time it paid off. BIG.

Some sweet LOL's (Little Old Ladies) who ran a hole-in-the-wall thrift shop in Coeur d'Alene had a few jars for sale, but they also told me they were overseeing an estate sale which is taking place next weekend. They were pretty sure there was a significant number of jars available. Did I want them?

You bet! I gave them my contact info and told them I'd take every last one.

Sure enough, they called last weekend and said there were nineteen dozen jars, as well as assorted boxes of lids and rings. Hallelujah!

I picked them up immediately.




Next Friday is the estate sale. I plan to go to that too.

Canning corn

'Tis the season for canning. I know this for a fact because there isn't a canning jar left in any thrift store in the region.

Last week our neighbors "the Jones's" called. They have a large garden they're sharing with other neighbors, but the other neighbors (we'll call them the Smiths) have been so busy they didn't have a chance to pick their share of the corn. And the corn was ready to pick. Did I want it?

You bet! Corn is by far our favorite vegetable. The girls and I went over with every laundry basket in the house and picked six rows of corn. I agreed to share the canned result with the Smiths in exchange for keeping some for ourselves.

Some of the Jones' kids and all of the Smith kids came over to shuck the corn. We saved the shucks to feed to the cows, who think it's better than candy.





This is how much corn we got:



After slicing the corn from the cobs (the cobs go to the chickens, who think it's better than candy), I washed and boiled the corn, then canned it.


We got 42 pints, of which 21 go to the Smiths. I'll exchange empty jars for full ones with Mrs. Smith.


Our own corn isn't quite ripe yet - we're in a race against the first frost - so even if we lose our own corn we have 21 pints in the pantry, thanks to the Jones's generosity.