North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

[Anne Seymour <aseymour@tpg.com.au>]

Hi everyone

Thanks so much for all the replies about blueberries and soil ph.  I want to 
thank everyone individually but that is probably just annoying to send lots 
of emails so here is a general thanks to you all.  

Here are my plans/ theories so far gleaned from your advice...

I have heard peat moss is great for blueberries and heard of some people with 
very alkaline soils growing them in bales of peat but I was wanting to avoid 
using it because of it's non-sustainable nature.  Shame as it would be a 
perfect solution.  

I just bought a bale of lucern hay and put my 14 year old son to work.  I got 
him to empty my compost bins (with my ph9 compost) and pile it all up 
together in a pile and then refill the bins in a ratio of one bucket of 
compost followed by one bucket of dried leaves and one bucket of hay, so a 
2:1 ratio of dry/brown/carbon : alkaline compost.  Hopefully after 6 weeks or 
so (I'm guessing here)  this will cook and turn my compost from ph9 to around 
neutral.  It should be beautiful and highly nutritious compost by then 
hopefully.

So now I have to be patient and wait 6 weeks till we can plant our 18 
blueberry bushes.  We are in Sydney, Australia so I will be using Southern 
Highbush varieties such as misty, legacy and also  magnolia blueberries and 
perhaps a Darrow.

After the compost is cooked then I will dig the compost into my garden beds 
(one is ph6 and one ph7).  Any suggestions here as to how much compost to how 
much soil?  I am assuming about two inches of compost dug into a foot deep 
hole of soil across a three feet wide.  Is that enough compost or should I 
put in more?  Don't know if more will be too rich and burn the roots?

I was then planning to do a wide mulch (well beyond the width of the bushes) 
of about 6 inches of lucern hay in the hopes that the hay will leach some 
acid into the soil as well as some nutrients.  I am also hoping that the 
mulch will protect the plants from competition with weeds as well as keep the 
roots cool.  As you said Alan, perhaps the high organic compost/soil mix and 
mulch will counteract the too high soil ph by providing more available iron 
and also I have heard that perhaps some blueberries fail not from too high ph 
but from their roots getting too hot as they are such shallow rooters.  
Perhaps the mulch and compost both help to provide low weed competition, more 
moisture and more iron and other nutrients making the ph less critical. 

If they don't do well I have the dry iron sulfate theory of Don Yellman sent 
by Lucky as a back up plan.  I wonder how often Don applies the iron sulfate? 
 I have read that vinegar diluted in water can be applied regularly (say once 
a month) to keep the soil acid though I have also read that it only works for 
a few hours to make iron available.  Anyone have any success using vinegar?  
Being into doing all things organically/naturally I will probably not even 
try vinegar but juice some lemons and put the lemon juice into a watering can 
diluted with water once a month to see if that works.  Always one to make 
things harder for myself!!!  I guess if the lemon juice doesn't work I could 
then try vinegar and if that doesn't work try the iron sulfate after that.

I have been trying to find some more mature blueberry plants and someone may 
have some 3 feet high plants about 4-5 years old growing in pots.  I will 
also be planting some tiny new blueberry plants but was wondering if I could 
also plant some of these more mature plants and not have to take off the 
flowers for the first 2 years and be able to let them fruit straight away as 
their root systems will already be bigger.  Would this work or should I still 
remove their flowers for 2 years so might as well just buy the cheaper tiny 
plants?

Any thoughts on my plans would be great.

Thanks 

Anne



 
On 01/04/2011, at 6:48 PM, Anne Seymour wrote:

> Hi
> 
> My teenage son has developed a love of growing things we can eat such as 
> watermelon, sweet potatoes, bilberries, etc.  We are now about to buy about 
> 15 blueberry trees (probably misty, legacy and magnolia) and wanted to ask 
> people's thoughts about ph.  I know they love an acid soil around4.5-5.5 
> but I did hear that some people on this list had the opinion that they 
> could grow in higher ph soils if they had lots of compost in the soil.  I 
> will be planting them in two beds one of which is ph6 and one ph7.  There 
> are a few azaleas and camellias happily growing in those beds now.  I have 
> heard contradictory things about blueberry requirements.  Some times I read 
> they like sandy, nutrient poor soil and at other places I have read they 
> love lots of organic material/compost.  
> 
> I have a couple of compost bins which have only ever had fruit and 
> vegetable scraps thrown in and the bins' ph is 9 so way too high for the 
> blueberries.
> 
> The soil in the beds has been undisturbed for at least 30 years since we 
> moved in.  
> 
> I am wondering if I should put in my compost in spite of the high ph in the 
> hopes that it will provide lots of organic matter and nutrients and that 
> the soil will 'buffer' if back to a lower ph relatively quickly.  
> 
> On the other hand perhaps I should keep the compost out as it will just 
> increase the ph and make my blueberries either die or produce no fruit.  
> Possibly I could add lots of dried leaves to lower the compost ph and just 
> use it later as a mulch.  
> 
> On the 'third hand' I had read the comment I mentioned earlier that they 
> can grow, and fruit well, in higher ph soils if there is lots of compost.  
> Presumably this means the iron and other nutrients are high enough because 
> of the compost to counteract the high ph.
> 
> I like to do everything 'organically' without additives or chemicals.  I 
> have read that I could just put sulphur, or sulphate of iron or flowers of 
> iron or iron chelate (no idea what is the differences between these)  into 
> the soil but I was desperately hoping I could avoid any of these and just 
> use my soil and compost.
> 
> I would really appreciate any advice.
> 
> Thanks
> 
> Anne
> 
> 
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