Here’s a photo of my pink popcorn going bloom crazy. I had a friend babysit it for the few years i was in Colorado and it was not happy. Suffered from a ton of diseases and was starving for years. I repotted it from 15-20 gallons to 25 last year, gave it a bunch of food, and sat it in sunlight. It’s really happy right now.
Apparently i have a giant 7-8 ft deer that’s come by and one of it’s favorites is Pink Lemonade as well because i just noticed it’s cleared off the tops of my pink lemonade as well as a bunch of flowers/potential berries. The birds seem to love the flowers of this one too which is surprising to me. I watched a bunch of birds yesterday just pick and eat the flowers on my oldest pink lemonade. I just bought 3 more of it this year but I may go back and grab more at this point if this is what I have to deal with with pink lemonade in the middle of the woods.
Chandler also says it’s grateful to no longer be hidden underneath my friends staircase and repotted last year.
I have over 50 blueberries in pots right now. Still not sure where i want to plant them in ground yet. Planning on having my friend dig trenches so i can bury the logs that he took down for me. Add on a thin inch of two patted down layer of peat moss and garden soil and plant my blueberries on top of it so that they’re not sitting directly on the logs. Everything will be slightly mounded. That’s the plan
Which varieties have been disappointing to people? I am hoping to jump on the Hartman’s 2025/2026 order and buy things like Hannah’s choice, Cara’s choice, blueray, Spartan, and Patriot, but am particularly curious on which varieties were disappointing in terms of anything (flavor, texture, size, production, sensitivity to soil pH, disease prone, size, etc).
Also, what are people doing to protect their blueberries from the birds? Is bird netting sufficient when put on the bushes at the right time?
Rubel to me, was just very sour and not much more to it. Bluecrop always had issues with me until i let it die.
In Colorado, I’ve had issues with lack of pollinators/pollination, hail taking out a good chunk of the plants/everything, and the water turning my soil alkaline. I had a small pink popcorn and pink lemonade die on me in Colorado due to all of the above in unison over 2 months
Here in Washington state, so far, I’ve only seen about 4 bumblebees although they work from sun up to 2 hours after dusk. Saw 0 when i lived in Colorado Springs but my neighbors sprayed EVERYTHING. and a green lawn was required by the hoa. I had gotten fined a few times for letting the dandelions run wild in my front yard when i was over there. A few honeybees so far but not many. Still waiting on my wasp friends to show up for mobile pest cleanup crew activities.
There’s been a bunch at the blueberry farms around me in western Washington that have been disappointing. I don’t know what varieties they plant though. I’m not a big fan of soft skinned blueberries or the smaller ones because they take more effort to fill a cup.
For animal protection, i would do a full on cage of 4x4 and hardwire something cloth or small hole critter fencing. If you can’t do that, i don’t think it’s worth it. If the birds end up getting caught and dying in the nets, you have the possibility of bird mites all over your plant along with a rotting carcass touching it
This was one of the names within the blueberry farms. A lot of people planted it for some reason but it tastes exactly like 2 week old berries from peru lol
Pink Lemonade was a big disappointment. No blooms for 2 seasons, so we probably don’t have enough chill. I pulled them up. My Sharpblues have been good producers with firm berries, everything else hasn’t ripened up yet.
My Sunshine Blues have similar leaf shape to my native Darrow’s Blueberries, so I wonder if it has parentage from them.
@Melon Do you have elk in that area? When I lived out west, the deer were easy to keep out. The elk were something else lol
I have a few young wild lowbushes and one huckleberry, and will be getting my first highbushes delivered tomorrow, then a few more in a couple weeks. All going in pots because the rest of the prime berry real estate is already taken up by stuff that didn’t need the soil to be amended.
Blueray is susceptible to sooty blotch, an emerging fungal disease. I don’t know much else about the disease, but I’d suggest asking your extension about it before investing in it.
Noted! It seems from this website there’s no harm to the plant. Are the berries no longer good to eat / does it hinder the plant’s growth, or is this an issue if it spreads to apples, for example?
surface of green stems and twigs, giving them a sooty appearance.
Disease cycle: The organism grows below the cuticle on plant surfaces. It does not appear to harm the plant
I had a blueray that wasn’t flowering, and the only thing that appeared wrong with it was that sooty blotch symptom. I didn’t dig much deeper into possible causes than that because I had other blueberries that were bearing. I just thought it might be worth mentioning.
I’ve noticed all the blueberries in one of the farms up north all have sooty mold.
I think it’s passed around from the types of bugs and high humidity. I haven’t had to deal with this thankfully even though i spray my blueberry plants with water in the summer in the mornings and evenings to knock off bugs.
Whatever likes to lay their maggots in the blueberries flower hollow seems to bring it. Some type of moth that isn’t the blueberry maggot fly. There was a lot of them in the Bellevue blueberry farm and still are last i checked. Charlottes blueberry park in Tacoma doesn’t have it as much as a problem.
The bush I have that has fruit is a mystery bush from our local farmers market, I did ask the variety but the lady didn’t remember and neither of us could read what she wrote on the original pot. This one and my Pink Lemonade bush are doing really well. My other bushes are struggling and I am not sure why, very easily could have been my fault.
If they didn’t have healthy roots or if they weren’t healthy to begin with, that may be why. I’ve noticed if they come sick, it takes year or two for them to recover. Mine from backyard berry are leafing out finally but no fruit on anything, even the bigger plants. When i got them earlier last year, they had a ton of rust fungus and i couldn’t get rid of it without stripping all the leaves. It didn’t spread but they were sad
Yeah just these 4 bushes alone give me and my little one and dogs AND the neighbor’s kids fruit all summer with some to spare for the wasps and whoever
Bags that high and short people will not be able to reach the berries. I would know. I’m already having trouble reaching the top ones with my 25 gallon pots
