Frozen Blueberries From Supermarket

the wild lowbush we pick here are definitely sweeter and are what Wyman sells. Brunswick is a improved cultivar of lowbush they plant. i have them growing under my high bush varieties. Hartmanns carries them. not a big berry but the flavor is fantastic. i just harvest and mix them with my high and mid sized blues. my 3yr. old niece raids them and my alpines straws when she visits. :wink:

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I’m eating a lot of frozen Blueberries and buying frozen Blueberries makes a lot of since for my situation.

I just need to buy something better than what I can grow and freeze.

We enjoy picking the first 9 or 10 buckets of ripe Blueberries early in the morning but after a while the enjoyment turns into a chore, especially when it gets hot.

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We really enjoyed the Blueberry festival too. I have been told that it’s possible to drive for a good while in Pender county and not see anything but blueberry bushes.

The excellent frozen Blueberries were grown by Cottle Farms and packed under the brand “Seal the Seasons.”

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I read your post and was motivated to try growing some blueberries again. My previous attempt was mistaken for weeds and wacked by landscapers.

I blindly bought 3 varieties at Kroger by Freedom Tree Farms: Jubilee, Northland, and Blue Ridge. Each were leaf’ed out about 2 feet high growing in a gallon sized pot . Two of the bushes had quite many flowers.

I picked off all the flowers and I planted them above grade each in a 6 gallon mound composed of peat moss, leaf mold, and 2 cups of sulfur (epsoma soil acidifier). Under each mound, I also mixed some sulfur into the native soil below grade as well. I topped off each mound with a bucket of wood chips.

How long do you grow your blueberries before cropping them?

That seems like a lot of sulfur. Is your soil extremely alkaline?

I don’t know exactly the ph of my soil but I’m expecting the bluebery to more grow into the peat moss/leaf mold. Straight peat moss is said to be 5.5 PH so I believe my mix of peat moss/leaf moud would be higher than 5.5 PH.

I followed the directions here. For each planting I mixed 2 cups of Epsoma soil acidifier (30% sulfur) with 6 gallons of peatmoss/leafmold. Unfortunately there’s not enough information in the instructions to for me to calculate exact amount of PH drop using 2 cups over 6 gallons of growing medium. 2 cups was guesswork from my part, including the exact amount since it was eyeballed.

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Thank you for the information about what company name to look for. I will try to find some in my area or at least know what stores carry it. If I am in an area that has one of those stores. Glad to know you also went to Burgaw to the Blueberry Festival. If I had know it was that great of a festival we would have gone there all the years she lived there in NC.

Variety selection is more important than soil preparation in many areas, like mine for example. You did not specify your location, but variety selection is probably critical there too,

No amount of peat moss, pine park and sulfur placed in the soil will allow me to grow any type of Blueberry other rabbiteye in a productive way, Our 300 plant experiment with SHB plants produces some fruit, but was a failure compared to our rabbiteye.

I’m not familiar with the varieties you purchased but I see Jubilee is a SHB from Mississippi where Northland was bred in Michigan to prosper in a much cooler climate

We normally remove the blooms in year 1 and 2 and get a small crop in year 3

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I’m in SW VA, somewhat close to you. Between zone 6b/7a.

After some reasearch, I think what I have are
Blue Ridge - Wild Lowbush Type ( Vaccinium pallidum)
Northland - Northern Highbush ( Vaccinium corymbosum)
Jubilee - Southern Highbush ( Vaccinium corymbosum)

Looks like an interesting experiment.

Some research I saw from VT a while back suggested NHB for your area . We visited a PYO Blueberry farm in Floyd county a long time ago that was growing NHB that looked great. I believe they wrote a book about their experience called “The Blueberry Years.”

I’ll keep you updated on my experiment. Hopefully I didn’t fry the blueberries with too much sulfur.

Floyd county is indeed one of colder areas, 10+ degrees colder than most piedmont area of VA / NC on a sunny day. PYO Blueberry farm, do you remember the address?

Sorry don’t remember the address, we visited the PYO farm in the 90’s.