Blueberries

Chuck,
Anderson's is in Poway also. Kartuz specializes in passies (among other plants), although I just checked their site and they got hit by this last winter's freeze. Says they hope to have available by summer...they do mail order, but you're welcome at the greenhouses also. I haven't been there in years but remember the last time I went there...loved it!
I could be wrong about Mark growing and selling passies...maybe I just pulled that out of the ether! He is, however, very knowldgeable about them and yes, a very nice person. Chuck, I'm pretty sure they didn't think you were drunk! lol...
I have 3 passies from Mark, thanks to his generosity! I don't know which passies you're looking for...I'm afraid to go looking...I'm very subject to the 'Gotta Have Virus" and I can feel a need to collect passies lurking.

Chuck....check Kartuz's web site...photos...you'll be drooling!

Hi All,

I've got a question for all you knowledgeable blueberry growers. I wrote back in June that my blueberries that I planted in half wine barrels were doing great and indeed they are. They have doubled their size in just these few months. I even have two bushes loaded with Blueberries.

I planted an equal number of bushes directly in the ground. We have a sandy loam so I amended the oversized planting hole soil with Azalea planting mix and pure peat moss. The plants were in 1 & 2 gallon cans and my planting holes were approximately the size of a 5 gallon can. Ratio of mix was approximately 50/50. I have all the bushes on a drip system. I have fed once with GroPower Plus which my acid loving plants love. I couldn't see a difference in the Blueberry bushes at all. The plants that are in the ground seem to be just sitting there. No major growth to speak of (of course I'm comparing them to the bushes planted in the wine barrels). The mix in the wine barrels is almost pure azalea mix and peat moss with a little sandy soil thrown in. Now I'm wondering if I should take up the blueberries that are planted in the ground and either plant them in wine barrels with a similiar soil mix or dig much bigger holes and do a complete soil exchange like I did for my Azalias? I should also mention we have very hard water here.

Does anybody have any suggestions?

Barb

This message was edited Sep 27, 2007 4:29 PM

There are a couple possibilities. One is that the ones in the ground spent a lot of time this year developing a good strong root system rather than putting out a lot of new top growth. The ones in the pots didn't have as much work to do with their root development. The other possibility is that your pH in the ground is not ideal anymore--if your soil is typically alkaline and your water is hard, chances are pretty good you've got a higher pH going in the garden than you do in the pots (although the hard water will raise the pH in the pots eventually too). So I'd check the pH of the garden soil. If it's higher than it should be and you'd like to keep the plants in the garden rather than in pots, I'd try amending around the plants as much as you can but don't actually dig them up, if you do that then they'll have to establish their roots all over again and that's not an ideal situation.

Liz! I just love that you always have such good answers! Do you carry over all of this wisdom and common sense into your everyday work life?
Sherry edited to add that I've found it works best for me to try to keep my mouth shut...somebody always says it better than me, and it's usually you! LOL...

This message was edited Sep 27, 2007 11:34 AM

Most of what I know I learned right here on DG! Either that or by killing my own plants and figuring out what I did wrong! LOL

Amen to your two main sources of knowledge, same here.

Great answer, too!

I'm sure the gradual alkalinization (I think I made that word up?) from the water, as well as simply using up the nutrients, is why my potted blueberries are slowing down and looking sparse after several years doing just fine. One of these fine days I will move them into bigger containers with acid mix for the additional filler. Well, I might. Then again, bareroot season is coming and I really like the size container they are in now... replacing with new plants AND new planting mix is less work and close enough to the same money, and I won't then be "stuck" with containers (like Barb's halfbarrels) that will be difficult to move...

~'spin!~

This spring I got 3 small tophat blueberries(Gurney's sale 3 for ?$,I forget) and a misty(I think-pretty sure).

The tophats are in small containers with a mix of Azalea mix,peat,and acid sandy soil from my parents land in Tahachapi(pine needles composted oak leaves mostly).

The tophats didn't like the heat a few weeks ago,lost a lot of leaves, but are growing back to where they were before the heat.

The Misty seemed to love the heat,it's in Azalea mix and peat that I mixed Azalea fertilizer in and soil sulphur.

The ph was about 6 for all containers and I think 4.5-5 is supposed to be what is perfect for blueberries.

I water with Liquinox Iron and Zinc concentrate(4tbs./gal. water) and super thrive(drops per gal.).
The plants got red/brown when I first put them in pots so I dosed them with Vinegar and water a couple times.A short term fixer upper for acid lovers in alkaline soil.Did the job till the sulphur kicked in.

The Liquinox really made them happy.
The guy at the nursery( Green Arrow) said It can't overdose anything-the plant will only take what it needs...

Also if the ph isn;t right for the plant it won't be able to get iron from the soil but can get it from the Liquinox because it's chelated so it can be obsorbed by the plant.
I don't have a clue if the Super thrive does anything-it's supposed to help make stuff more available to the plants.....

By the way the Tophats get morning/early afternoon sun.The Misty gets late afternoon to sunset sun.
Heat I think was the problem not sun-light.
I'm going to see if I can get a few branches to root in small containers.
I read you can scratch a branch by a leaf node and root hormone it,then cover it with damp soil.
It's supposed to root then you just cut it off the main plant.

I think the Tophats were rooted cuttings when I got them.They were just sticks in wet soil.Soon as they got sun they quickly grew leaves and branches.

Acid soils been my only hassle.The plants let you know instantly when the ph gets where they don't like it.
They are either growing like weeds or overnight get rusty colored around the edges of the leaves.
My soil in one for some reason keeps trying to go to 7.Sulpur takes a long time to kick in.
Might have something to do with moisture too.
It doesn't happen as much now that it's cooled off.Might take moisture to activate the sulphur and they get dryer in the heat.
I'll figure it out.
A garden wouldn't be as much fun if I couldn't mess with it once in a while.

All plants have a lot of new growth these days.

Well thats my story,I'm stickin to it.

Dear Smokemaster,

I just read your message today. Do the blueberry leaves turning rusty around the edges mean low acidity in the soil? I have this happening on both of my blueberries (O'Neal and Misty). I just assumed that it meant too much water. I have been holding back on water and instead of turning the leaves green, new healthy growth has appeared.

Thanks for sharing,

Chuck

My O'neals did fine through the heat/sun spell we had here up to 107 one day. I though Jubilee was a goner, down to bare sticks and couple of leaves left, but putting out new growth now. Thanks Stokemaster for the info,picking up some Liquinox this weekend.
Sherry

Sherry,

What is Liquinox? I would like to try it if it would give new growth to my blueberries. So far, there is very little foilage. I just assumed that the limited growth was due to the fact that they were less than a year old.

We had some pretty hot days, too!! Today's high for us, though, is supposed to be 76 degrees. Hooray for Fall!!

Thanks,

Chuck

Hi, Chuck,
Smokemaster mentioned above about using Liquinox..I think I'll check it out. I'd planted my blueberries in a very peaty, acidic mix and haven't kept a check on them to make sure what the ph is or anything, so apparently I should maybe pay more attention. I'll add that to the list of all the things I can't seem to get to lately..LOL.
Yes, I'm so thrilled to see Fall and drizzly days and PUMPKINS! Nothing makes me happier than big piles of pumpkins.

Smokemaster, I am so sorry. Sometimes my eyes don't register everything that is written.

I am going to apply vinegar and water to my blueberries on Sunday; then see what happens.

At the same time, I will buy some Liquinox!!!

Thanks again,

Chuck

Most of that info I got from the internet and tried it.

The guy at Green Thunb.Arrow told me about the liquinox.

I got the vinegar trick from a site for growing Azealas or some other acid lover.

I forgot to say I also put some Hydrogen Peroxide in with the Liquinox.
I did that because it seemed that the Azaela mix and peat was pretty fine and it really swelled up when it got watered the first time.
I thaught it might help the roots get more oxygen while the soil settled and the new roots were getting settled into the container.
I later read that Blueberries don't grow their roots deep so I don't really know if the peroxide did anything or not.
I figure it can't hurt or doesn't seem to have hurt anything.

I use a moisture,PH,and light meter to check the PH and moisture.
I've done PH tests on the soil with the one you put soil in water and drop a pill in it that I compared with the meter and they seem to both match so I guess the meter is right.
The water meter seems too sensitive,you have to decide where on the meter you water the plants at.

It also seems that even if only the edge of a leaf gets brown/rusty colored the leaf is a goner.It may take a while but it'll die.

The good thing is though the plant seems to grow new branches from where the leave died,more branches than if the leaves didn't die.
I've noticed the branches that never got brown leaves have little or no branches growing off them.
The new ones come out the bottom of the undamaged branches rather than all the way up the branch.

I've only had my plants a few months so I might find out I'm not supposed to do some of the stuff I'm doing now.

Like I mixed fertilizer in the soil before transplanting the berry plants.
It's not slow release but it is organic which a lot of the time is a natural substance that has to break down so the plant can use it-like sulfur.
Water reacts to the sulfur making sulfaric acid- you get acid soil.Takes a long time though,but once it does it's job it keeps doing it for a long time.
Thats why vinegar works for a short time,it gets washed away and evaporates.

I just found this PDF.It's about pests that like Blueberries.

http://www.smallfruits.org/CoAgentTraining/June07Training/7InsectManagement.pdf

Did anyones plants improve after using the iron suppliment?
Or the vinegar?
My sulfur must have kicked in,my plants are doing ok except something eats round sections out of the leaves.
I'm thinking it might be one of the worms/catapillars that come out at night.
I saw one of the bugs in the PDF on my plant today.I think it was a thrip.
Those guys are faster than a squirting bottle of insecticidal soap.
If there is one I'm sure there are more.

Here is another PDF

http://attra.ncat.org/attra-pub/blueberry.html#soils_fert


This message was edited Oct 11, 2007 8:49 PM