Summer is one of my favorite times at the farm because I love blueberries. And what’s wonderful about blueberries is that they last for 6 weeks! It’s not a super short season like black raspberries – 2 weeks at most for them. So what’s the story behind our blueberry patch? The patch we have now is big and lush and doing well … but it wasn’t always that way…
Years ago we had transplanted some bushes to a piece of property close to my house. We fertilized them and cared for them but they never did well. After a 2 or 3 years we finally just mowed them over. They never grew well, never really produced anything, we failed. But we didn’t quit. We studied up on berries and growing them and that lead to doing soil tests on the property where our current patch is. We didn’t have the right soil at all. Blueberries like acidic soil. We spent a full year getting the soil ready before planting a single plant.
Then it was time to plant…small, tiny plants. You hardly knew they were there! But we mulched them, fertilized them, added drip irrigation and they started to grow. Then the painful step…we picked off every blossom the first year. Crazy, right? Well, by doing this all of the plants energy goes to growth instead of berries and that’s what they needed.
The next year we opened up for pick-your-own. It was only 2 days/week for a few hours each day. They were small plants, just getting started. The following year we went to 3 days/week. There were times people would come out and not find as many as they had hoped. But the plants kept growing. The next year 4 days/week…then 5….then 6. Last year we added evening picking 2 days a week and this year we took the big leap to be open 6 days a week, 11 hours each day. And you know what? The plants are loaded with berries and it amazes me how each new day there are so many more than the day before. This is prime picking right now. If you enjoy picking come and see us. We expect it to continue until the middle of August.
