Blueberries o.k. near cedar trees?
krikit
15 years ago
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Comments (11)
krikit
15 years agoRelated Discussions
Blueberry on the deck
Comments (5)Since northern highbush blueberries like that variety require a certain number of chill hours, your bushes need to be out year-round, although if you have a garage or something, they could be moved into that. The reason why I mention this is because IMHO, ceramic is just not a good choice for large shrubs that need to get through a harsh winter due to their propensity to crack if not properly fired and sealed to keep water out (the water can freeze/thaw and make them crack like terra cotta). In addition, the paints used for ceramic are usually not for food use, and you have a danger - most particularly with acidic soil, of getting excessive lead and/or cadmium leaching into that soil. As a chemist I have tested many samples of dinnerware for lead and cadmium and would get samples of plates, cups, bowls or other vessels that were not only improperly fired, but were decorated with paints not for food use, thus leaching excessive lead and other toxic elements into acidic aqueous media. What might be better is to use a plastic or foam pot and then place that in the ceramic if you want a more decorative container for them. Natural materials such as terra cotta, stone, or concrete could work, but with respect to terra cotta - it's that issue of cracking again - at least over the long haul and shrubs like blueberries are long-lived. As 6" plants, I would start them in smaller containers until they build up more of a root system and then transplant them to a bigger container. Two of my five blueberries were originally 6" mail order bareroots and I put them in 12" plastic pots and there they remain some 11 years later and are about 5 - 6ft tall now. The other 3 that I have were older plants that came in 12" pots and I have kept them there. And although that size is not optimum, I still get nice harvests of blueberries most years - assuming they bloom when the bees are active and I get good pollination. My 5 are of 4 different types with different harvest times, so I can get some berries all summer through into fall. I would also keep both plants as that will help give you a bigger harvest. Although most blueberries are self-fertilile, cross-pollination between 2 or more has been shown to give a somewhat higher berry-set. It might be better to pot them separately in any case, although you could try growing them together if you are prepared to increase pot size accordingly. Your harvest may be reduced but then I always say to myself that these are for personal use as I am not a farmer trying to increase production for sales. With respect to soil - I usually mix up a non-specific type of soiless container mix (recently I've been using Promix) with about 1/2 sphagnum peat to give close to the proper acidity to start and then I'll fertilize about twice a year with Hollytone, which has a slow-release acidifier in it. Blueberries do best in pH 4.5 - 6, although there are a few varieties that can grow okay in that 6 - 7 range, but those are few and far between. Regarding self-watering - if you mulch with shredded pine needles and/or shredded oak leaves (the oak leaves being a good contributer to acidity), that will help tremendously with not having to water as often. The tricky thing about blueberries is that they can get root rot if overwatered but then they DO need moisture - particularly when berrying. However good drainage and the ability for the mix to dry between waterings (within several days) seems to be best in my experience....See MoreMaking acid soil for blueberries
Comments (68)I grow blueberries both in the ground in raised beds (5 plants in the ground for five years) and in sturdy black plastic plant containers (5 plants in 4 to 7 gallon containers)--that I picked up cheap from a local nursery. Two years ago, I harvested over four gallons of blueberries. Last summer the container plants were a bit of a bust as a late 90 plus heat wave after I'd cut the watering back resulted in the container plants having a very poor crop, but I still harvested nearly four gallons of berries from the plants in the raised beds. They are picked and put into gallon freezer bags and popped into the chest freezer. I don't even wash them, as I use no pesticides on them. I removed my clay soil in 2'x2'x15" deep sections and built the beds up to about six inches above ground level with a mix of 3 parts sphagnum peat moss, 1 part leaf compost my town produces, and 1 part of the clay topsoil. I reused the rest of the clay in another part of my garden. The container mix is simpler: 2 parts sphagnum peat, 1 part leaf compost. The beds have not needed additional soil or peat in five years. I mulch the beds with pine needles (not for the acidity as they don't actually contribute any, but for the fact they contain no weed seeds to speak of). I use bark mulch as a mulch in the containers--it stops squirrels from digging in them and weeds from growing. I use drip irrigation with city water at a pH of about 6.5 or so, and fertilize with Ammonium sulfate every spring, which also keeps the acidity level up. Fafard makes a sphagnum peat moss based acidic soil mix, so that's an option if you can get past the sphagnum peat moss issue. If you're only growing enough blueberries for you and your family, you are not really going to need a lot of the stuff. It's worth noting that for every person who thinks sphagnum peat moss is not a renewable resource, there's likely another who thinks the opposite is true. Here's what I know: In the US, our ubiquitous Canadian sphagnum peat moss comes from a country that has a lot of it and only harvests a small amount of it, and reseeds the harvested areas with ... sphagnum peat moss, which in the university greenhouse collection I help maintain grows quite quickly--I frequently have to cut it back to keep it from overwhelming our carnivorous plants that grow with it. In North American bogs, the moss grows several or more inches a year. The harvested bogs won't be replenished soon, but they aren't exactly turned into parking lots either. Then too, the harvesting process is not very carbon intensive in the scheme of things. You can read more about this perspective on the topic here: http://www.theecologist.org/blogs_and_comments/commentators/other_comments/1780209/the_truth_about_peat_moss.html and here: https://garden.org/urbangardening/?page=august_peat...See MoreAny Cedar City locals?
Comments (11)kimba217, I've lived in Enoch just a bit over 11 years. Fruits I have planted include: Almond, APPLE, apricot, blackberry, Cherry (BUSH & Tree), RED & WHITE CURRANT, JOSTABERRY (which is a black currant/gooseberry hybrid), grapes, nectarine, peach, Pear, PLUM. (I have gotten some fruit from the type capitalized...the most productive ones so far are _fully_ capitalized... no fruit from the others). Most failures here were due to late spring frosts, though some were also due to infestations of grasshoppers a few years in a row. Both problems can completely take out a plants new spring growth, killing the ones that don't have energy for a second start up. The first few years we lived here we tried several varieties of raspberries, but had no luck with them even making it out of dormancy. Sure would love to grow some, and may try again. The currant jam I make is wonderful, and raspberry might be even better! The very easiest grapes to grow is the concord types - they dislike alkaline soil a bit less than most others. I have Himrod growing ok...finally!!.. no grasshoppers and my scattered brain finally remembered to protect them from the early frosts! I was informed that American cultivars do best in our alkaline soil. I'm ready to try another variety but have to figure out where to put it first! I am basically an organic gardener and don't have allot of time to 'baby' most plantings but do have compost piles. As pawsitive said, compost is one of the best things you can do for your soil - no matter where you live. I compost everything that I have that is compostable and get horse manure from a couple of different sources... thankfully, many available around here. When we first moved here, our new home was on a blank, horrendously shimmery-HOT 1/2 acre! And, being an age that HOT was already a miserable internal-infernal thing, I needed trees immediately! We bought some fast growing willows and Souxland (sp) poplars. These have been very valuable to us to chip up branches to use as mulch! As other trees are growing up, some of the fast growing 'trash' trees have been eliminated, but some will always remain to add to the mulch. As for nurseries: The two local nurseries are Ladybug Nursery and Garden Park Nursery. Big Trees Nursery is a bit down south, in Kanarraville. Be aware that at least one nursery here carries a good variety of plants/trees/shrubs/etc. that do NOT tend to do well in our soil/altitude/winters/and/or winds. When I confronted them on why they carry plants that will have a tough time growing well here, the reply was "That's what some people moving in from out-of-state, or from different areas of the state, want. If they don't get them here, they'll just mail order them in." Many of the box stores also carry plants marked as 'perennial' which ARE perennial....in zone 7 or 8 or ... you get it... just not our zone. Use caution. If you don't want to waste your money, you still have to study the habit of whatever plant you are interested in, unless you want to use some as annuals. Yikes... too long a ramble! I apologize!! Hope this will be of use....See MoreIf you plant blueberries and dont pick them what animals will eat them
Comments (17)Everything! Birds, rabbits, possums, raccoons, bears... A tip for Birds: years ago I went for a cruise in the meditteranean and noticed out by the pool they had something over the pool and asked about it... the cabana guy said it was a strand of fishing line, to keep the gulls away so they didn't poop on everything. My 3rd year with 12 rabbiteye blue berries (climax/tifblue) I went from 30 gallons of berries to about 10 due to bird loss. So I strung 2 strands of mono philament fishing line above them anchored to bamboo posts on both sides... the birds will not go near it! Not sure if they are afraid of getting tangled or why... cheap and easier than bird nets! Now if I could just get rid of the rabbits!...See Morekiwinut
15 years agoericwi
15 years agogardenmama-123
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3 years ago
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