I have two mature blueberry bushes in our yard, and a few years back I added some blueberry saplings I bought from a catalog. The saplings are not doing well. Then last week I saw at a local store small blueberry bushes on sale for $9 each. I bought a few. I then surfed the web to see if I could plant these new blueberry bushes properly this time. Here is what I learned.
• don’t fertilize them when you plant them, and in the future , don’t use regular plant fertilizer, use on that specifically says for blueberries
• blueberries like acid soil
• blueberry bushes like wood chip mulch.
I got a bunch of woodchips from the town garage, they have a huge pile there, and mulched all my blueberry bushes.
Is there anything you can add to this so I can learn how to do this right? let me know below:
Melissa
Hi Eric and cameraperson and pups. Here are few vague pointers from my zero years of experience – blueberries like more sandy, well-drained soil. It would also help to add elemental sulfur to your soil (I’m not sure of the exact amounts, but if your soil has high clay content, you’ll need to add more). Also, are you able to plant them near your beehives? Could be a nice opportunity for symbiosis. Good luck!
Eric Gunnar Rochow
thanks for that info, i know our soil is acidic, but i’m going to do a test to see what the pH really is. our bees are not near the berries right now, but we might move them closer. thx, eri c
leo
hi eric, i’ve lived at my current home for 15 years at first when we moved we had these beautiful bushes that were full of white flowers in the spring and none of us knew what they were my mom thought they were just flowering bushes, because birds got to them before we saw blueberries on them. I know you probably thinking how you can not tell a blueberry tree, well where i come from we don’t have blueberries it’s native to north america so we didn’t know then. We did some renovation and those blueberry trees got pulled out and were relocated near a stone wall and neglected where’s nothing but rocks and sand and since we moved them there they’re covered with blueberries each year. I’ve planted some other blueberries bushes else where with better soil but they’re not near as full as the ones with sandy and rocky soil, however they do get a full day’s sun. It never sees to amaze me that something we didn’t care about turned out to be the only thing we look forward picking in the season.
redpigz
Hi Eric et al. I have grown blueberries for several years, with good and not so
good results. I think there are several steps to success, such as using sphagnum moss in the soil mix, light fertilizing with the soil-acidifying liquid
mix, and planting multiple varieties for cross pollination. Blueberries have
a shallow root system, but also don’t like “wet feet”. Nothing makes them flourish as much as pine needle mulch, if you can get some. I use to get a
load at a Christmas tree farm from the tree shaker stand, but now have
a steady source for twice yearly ground coverage. On my list of homegrown
food, blueberries are number 1!
L
Hi Eric, We have about 13 well established blueberry bushes lining our yard. We planted about 6 different varieties. We have about a 50/50 ratio on good producers and not so good producers. Some are big and hardy and some are still small and …well, don’t even get blossoms. My husband and I differ on our gardening habits. He likes to mulch, mulch, mulch everything. I like to take the let’s try this and see what it likes mode. I know that blueberries have a shallow root system so I went through them this year and “unburied” them from all the mulch, pulled a circle of grass about the circumference of the leaves and put a 1/4 inch layer of plain old potting soil over that so the roots wouldn’t suck air.( I wasn’t privy to any good soil at the time) They look great! not so smothered, which is what I thought they were. Anyway! I think I will try the pine needle mulch over the winter. and just keep them weeded well and see how they do in the next 2 years.