My birds eat apples two months before ripe and grapes a month early. I won't trust them one inch with blueberries. And how do you tell which ones they're eating? One trick is to look at the back side of the berry. That turns dark last. But that's hard to see on some varieties with tight clusters. Furthermore some need a week or several past being dark to lose the tartness. Protect from birds and force yourself to go without berries for a week. Test and if still not ripe enough wait another week. Another suggestion is to try other varieties. Living in FL you have many choices if you get enough chilling. Try Springhigh it tastes great even when still not fully dark and is very early. Sweet, low acid, and great blueberry flavor. Also get a Sweetcrisp which matures later. After you taste it you won't want another except to lengthen the harvest season. I think your Sunshine Blue would ripen last. By then you'd have it figured out.

1/3 - 1/4" pathway bark http://gro-well.com/lawn-garden/ground-covers/decorative-ground-cover-bark-small/ 1/3 peat moss, uncompressed 1/3 acid potting soil http://www.groworganic.com/dr-earth-acid-lovers-potting-mix-15-cuft.html 1 handful of soil sulfur (granular) per plant Above from the link I linked you that I guess you ignored. -sigh- I mix it thoroughly on a tarp. Acid fertilizer once a month mixed into its water per directions once plants take off growing. 3 yr. plants (often called 3 gallon) best despite cost because it takes 3 yrs for the blueberries to produce so might as well pay for someone else growing them that time for you so you can have near instant gratification. Half whiskey barrel containers are under the east side of a ash shade tree so they get morning and very late afternoon sun. Three blueberry varieties per barrel. Organic mulch about 4" deep--with ash leaves in this case. Blueberries are shallow rooted and thus very sensitive to dessication. Picture six barrels, one soil but no blueberries yet and two empties out of view. Here is a link that might be useful: This post was edited by Fascist_Nation on Sun, Feb 9, 14 at 16:53

It's normal for them to bloom now. Give them a good hit of fertilizer at the end of August; they like to put on a round of growth and new foliage in September. desert cat, keep the soil moist but not soggy, so maybe once a week in winter in your climate, but more often the rest of the year.

I wouldnt call P20 a selection of OSU Blue. This is because the parent material that contributes the anthocyanins was crossed with many different varieties resulting in many lines which were selected. Some of the info has been posted in research journals but it is probably more info than most could or want to digest. They could be sister lines or they could only share the same wild genetic base. It really doesnt matter too much. However working with P20, according to the literature, tends to have some better combos of desirable characteristics. Since OSU is something someone from the lab took and sent out one cannot be sure if it is this line or some other line. Good progress has been made on flavor with several lines. The question is really how much "blue" does one want and how important is the atv gene (which makes the foliage more purple and contributes just a little extra to the overall fruit anthocyanin content but adds wild "junk") really to an end goal of a fruit? There tends to be some genetic drag from the wild species that contributed the color which seems to negatively influence the flavor. So when one selects for the 2 different genes, there seems to be more "junk" genes from the wild species dragged along to overcome. There will be some true horticulture involved if one intends to grow these to sell with optimal color. Look at the pics in the link and one can see what happens if fruit are shaded and/or light doesnt get directly to them. One will likely have to adapt their cultural techniques and put more effort into their culture compared to normal tomatoes to let more light get to the fruit yet still not scald them (more spacing and more labor due to pruning techniques that allow more light to hit the fruit). Fortunately the anthocyanin seems to act like a sunblock and reduce scalding. This is odd since dark colors collect heat but I have yet to fully test that because I am not to a point of testing that issue. I have yet to see them scald when normal ones near them do. Here is a link that might be useful: a P20 project