Topic: Blueberry bushes

[Wrennie]

I planted 3 blueberry bushes the spring after I bought this house. There are 2 varieties that are supposed to be good in my zone. (forget the names right now) I had them out in the open and they werent growing at all, or the deer were nibbling them. I moved them into my veggie garden last year to see if the fence and looser soil was all they needed to do well. I have never seen a berry yet. The neighbor has a couple bushes  too. Never noticed berries on his but I don't inspect them often. Are the birds deer and bear just beating me to them? Mine are here 4 years. His are bigger and probably 10 years-ish
How old does a bush have to be before I get fruit?

[barleychown]

Well, the first thing that comes to mind is that blueberries need acidic soil. Have you checked the Ph of the soil they are in?

[Wrennie]

I used pine bark mulch where they first were and theres lots of pine around and therefore pine needles in my compost.
I havent tested the soil. Need to get a kit.
In fact I think I gave them some hollytone when first planted...

[Hillhound]

Blueberries
Barleychown is spot on with the soil PH needing to be on the acid side, around 4.5-5.5 is they say the best.
My other thought is Blueberries are also self sterile, there is only 1 variety that I’ve heard of that will self pollinate and that is something like Sunny Blue or Sunshine Blue, I’m not sure of it’s name. If the plants you bought are different varieties then that is probably not the problem, Maybe if your neighbours plants are of a different variety then they might cross pollenate each other.
The pine needles are ideal for Blueberries, they make a fantastic mulch.
Blueberries also need hard pruning each year to make them flourish.
If you bought the plants as pot grown they would probably be around 6-8 inches tall, these should under normal circumstances fruit in the first year and then crops increase in size each year provided they are not disturbed.
They also like well drained but moisture retentive soil.

I started mine 2 years ago in large pots of around 25 litres of soil less compost and they did OK but took a lot of watering during the good summer we had, last March I moved them into the main bed, this is around 25’ x 30’, the bottom of the bed is held back by large flags stood on end so drainage is pretty good. We are on heavy clay soil so I reckoned that the compost they were already in and the peat I back filled the holes with should be about right. Unfortunately we had a diabolical year and although fruit set it all got washed off. I’ll keep you posted on this years achievements or not as the case may be.

Although we had fruit the first year apart from a couple of berries I picked off the bush we didn’t get to eat any though, our 2 little dogs discovered them and ate the lot! So I’ve also got that little problem to sort out!