Going through my canning jars

[bearcreekfarm]

A friend brought me MORE canning jars yesterday- yikes!

I am not sure anymore how many jars we own, but easily in the thousands. Many thousands, lol.

I seem to have a minor obsession with canning jars. I think it started when I began keeping bees and needed jars for honey. I am a bit of a purist and refuse to pack honey in anything other than glass jars- which is too bad because those plastic squeeze bears are super convenient! But even way back then the canning jars seemed expensive to me so I started looking all over for cheap used ones rather than buying new jars. I was living in Florida at the time, where nothing was more than 50 years old, or so it seemed So, no attics, basements, or old barns filled with grandma's canning jars.

But then I moved to rural MN where families have been putting up food for generations and discovered that jars are easy to come by here. I bought hundreds of them before freecycle came along and I was able to post in search of free ones. I also discovered farm auctions where, incredibly (to me anyway) old jars could be bought for a pittance. Sometimes. Other times collectors would swoop in any buy all of the antique-y jars for a king's ransom, but I wasn't interested in the collectible ones, just wanted good used jars for canning and/or honey.

I have gotten hundreds of jars from people who were moving or going into assisted living facilities and had jars full of food to get rid of. Sadly, many people just toss those in the trash, but occasionally I will get a call from someone who will give them away for the hauling. If the food is in good enough shape I feed it to my chickens. If really old, or questionable, it goes in my compost bins.

But yesterday a friend came over for supper and brought 5 boxes of jars that she doesn't want anymore. Nice, lovely, mostly new, and CLEAN jars- what a treasure, lol. So I am trying to find a spot in my already-overflowing pantry for these new jars. She brought some that I have never seen before- made by Ball, they are 1.5 pint wide-mouth jars. She tried to use them in her freezer but found that the bottoms were breaking off- just the bottoms- weird. So she passed those along to me, and also included some old antique half-pint and pint jars. I love the old jars- they just feel so much heavier and better-quality than the newer jars. And I find it fascinating that many of my jars are almost 100 years old- maybe older. I have a lot that are 60-80 years old as well. Back before our daughter was born hubby gave me a collector's guide one Christmas and even though I don't (really) collect them, I do find it fascinating to research the history of some of these old jars. I wonder how many times some of them have been used, and what was put in them.

Then I went to the recycling drop off yesterday, which I have not been to in months, and found some half-pint jars in one of the bins. Most of them were broken because someone just tossed them in with a bunch of other glass, but I pulled out the ones that were intact, brought them home, washed and sterilized them, and added them to my other new-to-me jars. I give away quite a few jars of food during the year and sadly, some of my friends don't reuse or return the jars- crazy, I know! But I don't feel too horrible about it when I know that I can probably replace them at no cost- it just pains me to think of the waste

If the S ever does HTF hubby and will be set for life in the canning jar department, lol. Or, set for years of honey production when we get back into bees (hopefully soon).

[ceresone]

Doubt I will be checking my canning jar storage anytime soon, because beside them is where I killed a copperhead!!

[mzgarden]

bearcreekfarm, wow, thousands. That's a lot of jars. Not a bad thing to collect and use. Love that yous save them from the landfill.
ceresone, yikes!

In the last couple weeks, two friends have dropped off boxes of clean canning jars, rings and even some boxes of lids. No one else they know cans. Of course, I use them for storage as well. I was able to put together several boxes of small mouth jars (pint & quart) and pass them along to someone, so I'm able now to focus on only large mouth jars.

[bearcreekfarm]

Jun 30, 2019 22:44:15 GMT ceresone said:

Doubt I will be checking my canning jar storage anytime soon, because beside them is where I killed a copperhead!!

Yikes!

I wouldn't be rushing to check on a bunch of old jars either if I had to contend with poisonous snakes

[bearcreekfarm]

Jun 30, 2019 22:50:18 GMT mzgarden said:

bearcreekfarm , wow, thousands. That's a lot of jars. Not a bad thing to collect and use. Love that yous save them from the landfill.
ceresone , yikes!

In the last couple weeks, two friends have dropped off boxes of clean canning jars, rings and even some boxes of lids. No one else they know cans. Of course, I use them for storage as well. I was able to put together several boxes of small mouth jars (pint & quart) and pass them along to someone, so I'm able now to focus on only large mouth jars.

I don't know anyone who cans, except for a few friends my age who already have more jars than they can use. But I think that my young nephew and his wife want to start doing some canning so we will probably haul a bunch of jars down the their place the next time we go for a visit.

[ceresone]

I don't can like I used to, but I would never part with my two all american canners, and have one and 3\4 presto! Figure when I die my daughters will pitch them, as neither are interested!
I do love canning!

[Ozarks Tom]

In my opinion canning jars are like onions in a recipe, there's no such thing as too many.

We have three freezers and two generators. If the grid goes down we can keep the refrigeration going long enough to can everything in them. Matter of fact, we probably have more jars than necessary for that purpose, but like I said about never having too many...

We went way up to Northern Kansas to get some jars from Wally. They were packed in plastic totes, and separated with newspapers. Even traveling about 300 miles on a 16' trailer we only had one broken jar, and that was my fault for not securing a tote properly. It's amazing how durable they are.

[Tim Horton]

We also have a significant supply of canning jars.. Here in the north we have 2 Canadian brands as well as Ball and Mason brand. Bernardin brand with common standard and wide mouth. We also have Canadian Jem jars with an in between size mouth. Lids and rings are still available, so we use them for dry storage and occasionally as pressure canned.

Sweetie will not pressure can with Walmart jars. Too many fails to seal, broken jars in the canner, and jars that break when un sealed. We only use them for dry storage, vacuum seal storage, and give away products where we won't see the jar again.

[wally]

Our children are not into canning and I can't think of any of the younger generation that can. Sure hope that canning does not become a thing of the past like cursive writeing.

[lindym]

Jul 1, 2019 3:29:43 GMT Tim Horton said:

We also have a significant supply of canning jars.. Here in the north we have 2 Canadian brands as well as Ball and Mason brand. Bernardin brand with common standard and wide mouth. We also have Canadian Jem jars with an in between size mouth. Lids and rings are still available, so we use them for dry storage and occasionally as pressure canned.

I live a bit South of the Canadian border in Washington State, and somehow ended up with an "in between" jar as most of my jars are used. I'm not sure how many times last Summer I filled and dumped out that jar when I would go to put a lid on it. I finally threw it way and I felt so guilty but it was driving me crazy!

[moldy]

you can have all the jars in the world but if you dont have 10 times as many lids the jars are next to worthless. the lids are the Achilles heel of canning.

[bearcreekfarm]

Jul 3, 2019 2:48:18 GMT moldy said:

you can have all the jars in the world but if you dont have 10 times as many lids the jars are next to worthless. the lids are the Achilles heel of canning.

True, but now that reusable lids are available we are stocking up on them as we find them on sale.

[Tim Horton]

I live a bit South of the Canadian border in Washington State, and somehow ended up with an "in between" jar as most of my jars are used. I'm not sure how many times last Summer I filled and dumped out that jar when I would go to put a lid on it. I finally threw it way and I felt so guilty but it was driving me crazy! >>>>>>>>> Don't feel bad... That is exactly the right thing to do.
!@#$%
you can have all the jars in the world but if you dont have 10 times as many lids the jars are next to worthless. the lids are the Achilles heel of canning.
True, but now that reusable lids are available we are stocking up on them as we find them on sale. >>>>>>>>> Yes, very true.... A few years ago Sweetie made a substantial investment in the "Tattler" brand of reusable lids with the replacement rings. They have worked quite well, however they do have there own learning curve to learn to use. Not difficult to use or learn, just a bit different.
>>>>>>>>>
Are there other brands of reusable lids out there ??

[feather]

Tim Horton, I was researching whether there were competing reusable canning jar lids, last year, because I wanted to try them. I only found one other company besides Tattler. That company was not getting good reviews and was in the process of going out of business. I can't find them on the web right now--maybe they are gone now.

I was looking for the tattlers at the best price too. I bought a dozen boxes of each the large and regular lids. I love them, they work great.
homesteadingfamilies.proboards.com/thread/12453/inventory-jars-reg-wide-food

[bearcreekfarm]

The only ones I know of are the Tattler brand.

We like them, and we do use them, but I find a higher rate of failures with them. And, I occasionally find a jar on my pantry shelf that has come un-sealed during storage

But I still think they are a great deal. We never buy them unless they are 50% off regular price.

[janinco]

True, lids are the curse of us canners. The new ones often fail, are too thin and can only be used for canning once. Do wash and use them for dry storage, marking your garden rows, etc. I've had mixed results using Tattlers, I'm sure my own fault, as most of them seal just fine. I'm going to invest in more of them this year, too. I hate to give them to anyone except family members who know to return them to me, so I use the metal flats for gift items.

I had a woman years ago, who gave me jars of old food she had canned and stored under her house. It was icky going under there so her son fished the deteriorated boxes out for me. The lids had actually rusted through from the moisture, and the food wasn't even something I could identify on those that weren't rusted, but I composted all of it, and some I couldn't even get the lids off. Still glad to have them. I posted an add years ago for free 'fruit jars' which is what they were called where I grew up and got no responses. When I changed it to canning jars, several people responded, gave me jars and some freezer containers. Some of the lids were really old. My sister paid near new price at a garage sale for Bernardin lids, something not sold here for many years, and they were useless. Had been stored in the top of a woman's garage for 29 years, and the heat had ruined the rubber seal. I tried a few, but it just deteriorated and made a mess. Too bad. I have three pressure canners and about a half dozen water bath canners that my sister kept buying at sales. I'm going to get new seals for two of the older Presto canners, test them and make sure they work and then sell one of them. Might invest in an AA canner just for the sake of not needing that rubber seal. I saw that the new packs of seals also include the rubber pop up thing, which ought to be replaced occasionally, too. Now, if only I had something to can!

[lindym]

Last winter a generous member shared some Tattler lids and rings that he had gotten from another generous member. I am excited to try these out this summer. We live in apple, apricot, and cherry paradise!

[Ozarks Tom]

We use Tattler lids on an irregular basis, mainly for meals. At first we had problems with sealing, so I called Tattler and found out I'd been using them wrong. The Tattler folks told me to tighten the ring down like usual, but then back it off 1/4 turn. Immediately upon taking the jars from the canner to tighten the rings down hard.

Since then we've had very, very few failures to seal.

[feather]

Jul 3, 2019 20:33:50 GMT Ozarks Tom said:

We use Tattler lids on an irregular basis, mainly for meals. At first we had problems with sealing, so I called Tattler and found out I'd been using them wrong. The Tattler folks told me to tighten the ring down like usual, but then back it off 1/4 turn. Immediately upon taking the jars from the canner to tighten the rings down hard.

Since then we've had very, very few failures to seal.

I've had good luck with them 100/100 with tomatoes. I tighten them then back off one quarter inch (not 1/4 turn), process, tighten them. But it's good to know I could back them off a bit more if necessary.

[lindym]

Jul 3, 2019 20:33:50 GMT Ozarks Tom said:

We use Tattler lids on an irregular basis, mainly for meals. At first we had problems with sealing, so I called Tattler and found out I'd been using them wrong. The Tattler folks told me to tighten the ring down like usual, but then back it off 1/4 turn. Immediately upon taking the jars from the canner to tighten the rings down hard.

Since then we've had very, very few failures to seal.

I had come across this information when I was researching the Tattler lids, thanks for the reminder as we are going to can cherries in the next couple of days.

[northerngardener]

I just bought some of these: canninglids.com/ Harvest Guard reusable canning lids. They look just like Tattlers, but are half the cost. Haven't tried using them yet.

[bearcreekfarm]

Jul 6, 2019 16:02:15 GMT northerngardener said:

I just bought some of these: canninglids.com/ Harvest Guard reusable canning lids. They look just like Tattlers, but are half the cost. Haven't tried using them yet.

Please report in after you try them!

[mountainlover]

Jun 30, 2019 20:16:18 GMT bearcreekfarm said:

If the food is in good enough shape I feed it to my chickens. If really old, or questionable, it goes in my compost bins. 

That's a good tip! I've always just tossed questionable food. It's good to waste less.

Enjoy your boon of jars.

[bearcreekfarm]

Jul 19, 2019 19:57:47 GMT mountainlover said:

That's a good tip! I've always just tossed questionable food. It's good to waste less.

Enjoy your boon of jars.

Thanks, I am! I am dehydrating a bunch of herbs and flowers this summer and as it happened I needed some half-pint jars.  I don't have a lot of them because I prefer using the

pint jars for jam for my own family. But I do use the half-pints for jam that I plan to give away, and I gave some away last year so I was in need of more the other night. Sure enough, I found a couple of dozen half-pint jars in the boxes I got from my friends.

Then, yesterday, a lady I don't even know gave me five more boxes! They were really dirty- glad she did not just toss them. I know that I will wind up giving a bunch of these to my nephew and his wife when we go to visit them in December. um, I will wash them first cause I am a good auntie

[mountainlover]

Lucky nephew

[karenbc]

Treasure friends that bring you canning jars!

Tim & I are lucky - where we live used jars are fairly easy to come across. All the thrift stores carry them. Garage sales are good sources.
As is the recycle bin - we likely are not supposed to dumpster dive in the glass bin - so we kind of park in front of it, and while we are adding our glass bottles, we hunt for canning jars. There is a spaghetti sauce brand up here that is a pint sized mason jar, and the canning lids fit perfectly.

Lids are the kicker. I purchased a LOT of Tattler lids about 10 years ago. They take a while to get the knack off. I like them for pressure canning more than water bath. I seem to have better luck with it.

I find that the thrift stores often have brand new packages of one-use lids. The "GEM" jar size - between regular & wide size are getting easy to find. I think newbies buy them, thinking they are getting the wide size. I wasn't keeping or buying any Gem jars I came across, until I realized how often I was finding the lids.

In the kitchen I keep my lids in an old potato bin. The one-use lids are in the top portion, and the Tattlers in the bigger bottom section.

One thing to watch for in buying lids from 2nd hand sources - if the box looks older, check that the rubber sealant is still in good shape. I've had a box where the rubber compound disintegrated as soon as the lids were warmed in water. What a mess that was!

[mogal]

Jul 3, 2019 2:48:18 GMT moldy said:

you can have all the jars in the world but if you dont have 10 times as many lids the jars are next to worthless. the lids are the Achilles heel of canning.

To paraphrase:

You can't be too thin, too rich or have too many canning jars and lids...

I read this post to DH and he asked me if I'd reached the 10x milestone.  I think I have but I'm not sure.  Every time we find a sale, I buy more over the rate I use them.  In the summer of '74, I worked for a natural gas utility in northeast Arkansas.  We did a gas grill promotion at grocery stores in the various towns and at each, ladies asked me if I'd seen lids in any of my other towns.  I hadn't even though I wasn't canning at that point (still single, living in a tiny apartment) but I started checking more closely--none, nowhere in my whole territory that ran from Paragould to Forrest City, Batesville to West Memphis.  We were married that fall and moved to our own place with fruit trees and garden space the next spring so my viewpoint changed quickly as our need for them grew.  

[Tim Horton]

Sweetie has the sharpest eye for jars, lids, rings, and canning hardware at garage sales and thrift stores. Today between sales and thrift stores she scored about 9 or so boxes of lids of multiple sizes.

I never noticed a one.. She says it is because I look at stuff like a man ?

[Rustaholic]

I am in lid buying mode. My sweet wife is going through the full parts of the basement and she told me she found six water bath canner kettles and three pressure canners. She also found the six wire frames that you put in the water bath kettles to pull all of the jars out at once. I knew I had one of the wire jar pullers for each kettle.

[moldy]

.... I don't hoard canning jars, I just have a very extensive collection!