My partner transplanted a small raspberry bush from the side of the McCarthy Road to the river bluff in front of our cabin building site. Twelve years later, we have a cabin and a thriving raspberry patch, though I am not sure if the wild raspberries came from that one transplant. Wild raspberries, Rubus idaeus, are fairly common in the Interior and Southcentral Alaska, and they love to grow in sunny disturbed soils along riverbanks, roadbeds, and other edge habitats. Tending this wild patch of plants is my favorite type of gardening. We care for them by watering them with our gravity fed hose and pruning back old canes, but they would grow here anyway. I look forward to July and August days where I can go out in the morning and pick a handful of berries for my morning yogurt. I like to pick their leaves, too, and brew them into a nutrient rich tea. Wild raspberries are a bit smaller, seedier, and less sweet than the cultivated kind, but they are packed with flavor and taste like pure summer. Raspberries are great on their own fresh off the bush, but they are delicate and don’t travel very well. If you do want to take some of that flavor with you, or save it for later, I recommend capturing it in home-baked raspberry bars. This recipe, inspired by a Linzer torte, calls for walnut and cinnamon in the crust. The nuts add a warm, earthy flavor.