Blueberries

Why two bushes beat one

One blueberry bush is lovely. Two or more varieties are better. Blueberries set a heavier crop — and bigger berries — when a different variety is blooming nearby, so the bees can carry pollen between them.

The five we carry are deliberately spread across the season. Pair an early with a late and you stretch picking from early summer well into the back half of it.

Rabbiteye or highbush?

Rabbiteye — Premier, Tifblue, Powderblue — is the type that has always done well in this part of North Carolina. Tough, large, tolerant of our summers.

Southern highbush — O’Neal, Legacy — ripens earlier and stays a little smaller. Worth having for the head start.

Both will pollinate better with a partner of the same type nearby, so if you only have room for two, take two rabbiteyes or two highbush rather than one of each.

Planting

Sun, drainage, and acid. Dig a wide hole rather than a deep one — blueberry roots are shallow and fibrous, and they run out sideways looking for air. Set the plant at the depth it grew in the pot, water it in, and mulch three inches deep with pine straw or pine bark, keeping it back off the stems.

The first year

Pick the flowers off a first-year plant. It feels wrong, and it is the right thing to do — the plant puts that energy into roots instead of fruit, and you get a bigger harvest for the next twenty years out of it.

After that, water deeply through fruiting, and expect the bush to take three or four years to hit its stride.

Birds

They will find the berries the day before you decide to pick them. Netting works, and so does planting enough that you can afford to share.