What are the earliest you get ripe blueberries in your area?
What varieties do you grow, which are early, which are late?
What do yo mulch your berry plants with & how hard & often do you prune them? Do the plant produce sucker or do you root them.
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Oh I love me some blueberries. This is the beginning of year two in my little patch, so I can’t give great info on when they’ll produce. I’m growing friendship (my favorite tasting), chandler, reka, blue crop, blue ray, Brigette, ka bluey and Hannah’s choice. Next year I want to add rubel and Cara’s choice. I pruned them all about 2 weeks ago and I mulch them with pine bark. Also experimenting with coplanting annual rye around my bushes as I saw online some scientists found that grasses can reduce the need for acidic soil because of how grasses make iron available for blueberries. The soil surrounding the holes I dug is super alkaline clay and I’m hoping I can steadily improve it with cover crops before the roots reach.
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I have 5.5 pH here in S.C. so I do not need to lower my pH.
Talk to your Extension agent, but I would use gypsum or surfer on the soil. Pine bark is what I am mulching with this year for the first time in twenty years. The pine bark is low pH, but when it rots, it will be 7.0 pH. This is also true about pine straw.
I use bone meal on everything, but my Blueberries, because most plant fall in the 6.0 to 6.5 pH, some will grow in 5.5 to 7.0 range.
I started this thread to see what other home grower are doing, never to old to learn.
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I’m growing Northern and Southern Highbush,plus a few Rabbiteye,near Seattle.All except for a Bountiful Blue are in containers.
They have been flowering,the last couple of weeks.Hannah’s Choice,may be the earliest ripening,that I have.Some others are Sunshine Blue,Misty,Emerald,Star,Sweetcrisp,Cara’s Choice,Legacy,Razz,Rubel,Powder Blue and Tiff Blue.
The dead stuff is pruned out,along with a couple of older canes,before growth starts,in late Winter.
During my visit with my sister,about two weeks ago,in Surfside Beach,SC,I helped her plant two Rabbiteyes,probably Premier.
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I am in southern middle TN z7b.
I have a few varieties of rabbiteyes… tifblue, climax, powder blue, brightwell, etc…
I looked at my blueberry pics from the last two seasons and my earliest harvest pic was May 28… the latest was July 7.
My climax berries ripen first with tifblue joining in a week or two later.
Think all my varieties are early to mid season ripeners… they are over and done by early/mid July.
I have 2 climax and 1 tifblue that are 7 ft tall and 6 ft wide. Thousands of berries on those bushes now… sizing up… looking good. Looking like my best blueberry crop ever this year.
I prune out older wood that has become less productive or anything dead or too crowded.
I mulch my blueberry bed with either pinebark mulch or just regular wood chip. Early this spring… i covered the previous mulch (pine bark) with a layer of 2 year old wood chip (about 50% compost at this point) and then on top of that a layer of fresh wood chips.
My rabbiteyes are perfectly happy with my ph of 5.5. I fertilize with mostly holly tone… early spring… and then again when last fruit is harvested (mid July)… with holly tone and some high N miracle grow type water sol fertilizer. I get some good late summer early fall growth.
Mine do produce some suckers… 2 to 3 ft away from the main plant. I have not tried to transplant any of those yet.
TNHunter
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The big Commercial operator down the road is already running his first picking since Wednesday. Not sure which bushes they are picking. By farm size he had to plant multiple types they have so many.
Saying “Rabbiteye” or “Southern Lowbush” does not cut it anymore. There are numerous varieties now. We are about to be picking our Alapaha and Titan bushes. Want to get some of the new Summer Sunset. But it is a new release and not easy to find in stock. A mix of pink and nearly black berries on those.
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Hard to believe with Climax and Tifblue; but they have pretty much been replaced in farm production. Vernon has just about ran Climax off. Poor Tifblue is losing space to newer berries that hang tough and do well with mechanical harvest. Like Titan.
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Love my tifblue and climax berries.
Big and tasty berries. Climax are a bit larger and earlier… but both taste very good and produce gobs of berries for me.
They may be older varieties… but so am I 
Mine get picked mostly by my fingers… this year some by my grand daughters fingers.
Definately keeping them… been very happy with them for 10-15 years.
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I have pink lemonade, biloxi, O’Neal, Emerald, Climax, Sweetheart, Rebel, Premier, powderblue (1 of each except 3 biloxi) I got them all as really small plants so not a ton of production from any just yet, but sweetheart are by far the most disappointing so far. Very low vigor, and definitely not producing two crops per year as claimed.
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I have both too. And I am keeping them. Just staggering how fast new cultivars are released. There are like five recent blueberry releases I want. Especially the pair that can be trimmed like a boxwood hedge. Gonna line the front door walk with them.
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Bradybb in Seattle.
I going down a rabbit hole here, I bought plants from https://nativefoodsnursery.com
Lingon berry, Black Gooseberry, Black Huckleberry & Buffalo berry
I am worried they will not do well on the East coast, they look fine now.
Back to OP. My berries are large, but still green, so there is a eight week difference in your plants & my plants here in S.C.
I see articles about Blueberry plant ripening in August, that means they would be late June/July here in S.C.
I only have Rabbiteye, but I will get some Northern & Southern Highbush, to see if I can lengthen my Blue Berry harvest.
Elliott, Endura, & Duke are some I am looking at.
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I am in Georgia and Silver Buffalo Berry and Black Huckleberry are practically weeds. Lots of Box Huckleberry too.
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Southern Highbush will most likely win out,over the Northern.It will be interesting to see if they thrive there.
Elliott is late,while Duke is early.
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@FigGuy Lingon may be a stretch in your area. But I’m growing them in Arlington, VA (7B) and some varieties are doing okay, while a few died out. Also search the forum for some Lingon berry threads… I don’t see anyone who’s gotten much of a harvest even when they survive. Not trying to dissuade you, but if you are choosing who gets the best spot or how much effort to put in each type your growing it is something to consider.
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It is like Currants. They will not do much around here. Too Hot. I would not think Gooseberries will do well in South Carolina either. What is your heat zone?
We are 8b with a 9 heat zone here. Pretty much like your coastal zones. Because a lot of South Carolina coastal/piedmont plants grow well here.
Like I prefer your sweet Carolina Black peanuts here. They love the heat. You just can not find them anymore.
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I have 1 “dwarf” (the pot just says dwarf and I lost the tag), 2 Pink Lemonade and 2 Sharp Blue that I got just before winter this year (all less than 3 feet high). The Sharp Blues are nearly ripe and full of fruit, the dwarf one has a small amount of fruit that is nearly ripe, and the Pink Lemonades lost alot of buds but are opening up others now. The ones that have less fruit have really pushed out new growth though.
I mulch them with pinebark, and I haven’t had to prune them yet.
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Zendog,
I have one Lingon berry plug, that is in a gallon pot, so I can baby it till winter. Then I going to plant it in the ground, water & mulch, but no more babying it, if it can not make it then I will grow another fruit plant. I have the room for more plants, but want them to be independent of a lot of care. Five acres is a lot of space to take care of & I can not spend a lot of time on one plant.
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I am on the line of 8a/8b with a heat zone of 8. I had a hybrid Goose berry & red Currant fifteen years ago, they lasted about three year.
I grew Virginia peanuts, never heard of black peanuts, until today.
I have to keep trying to grow plants that are not local to S.C. just to see what will fruit here. I like reading, but I am old school I learn by doing. thanks
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sharq,
Dwarf?? it maybe: Lowbush varieties
Generally only growing up to 18 inches tall
- Top Hat is- used for ornamental landscaping
- Ruby carpet - grows well in USDA zones 3-7.
I am guessing, the only low bush Blue berry plants I have are wild plant that came up in my pine thicket. They survived the loggers, so I bushed hogged around them. They come in late & are not sweet, but not sour, just not hybridized to be sweet.
I have 17 cubic yards of pine fines (small bark pieces) used for potting plants, to mulch my berries, it was cheaper than buying bags at big box store.
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