Another question about blueberry bushes...

Hello,

Last spring I acquired two blueberry bushes. One was a leaving gift from people at work, so I dont know where it came from. The other I bought myself from a reputable garden centre in Bristol as company for the first. They both had small amounts of fruit last summer.

During autumn and over winter one of the bushes seemed to get very poorly and had a very different transition from the other. The seemingly healthy bush had its leaves turn brown and eventually fall off, as you'd expect. The other bush lost all of its leaves very quickly (in the space of a week or so) and the bush itself - stems, branches, etc - all turned brown. The bush now looks quite unhealthy, kind of withered and brown as if it has died.

Both bushes were the same size, potted into the same size pots usine ericaceous compost. They were both kept in the same position on the patio throughout summer, autumn and winter. They may have been different varieties of blueberry i'm not sure.

Does anyone have any idea what happened to the one bush? I'm guessing its now beyond recovering, its just very strange that one bush seems so unhealthy and one is fine, given the very similar conditions they were both kept in and given they were both healthy and bearing fruit last summer!

I can maybe post photos of the unhappy bush if that would help...?

Thanks in advance for any advice guys.

Cheers, Tom

 

I've posted something along the same lines here.
I bought 3 blueberry bushes from Suttons.
2 were in poor condition when arrived, they are sending out replacements.
The other 1 started getting leaves and small flowering buds.
The flowers have now came out, however the leaves have wilted and started falling off. I'm interested what has happened?

 

May I join your blueberry thread instead of starting another please? I bought a blueberry in the Spring from a nursery, and it was covered in flowers when I got it. It is planted in ericaceous compost . As the flowers matured and dropped off I have been left with a lot of small fruit. The earlier developing ones are fattening nicely. However, since the weekend Ive noticed loads have fallen off. There are still fruits left but much reduced. Is this natural ( bit like a June drop ) or maybe the heavy rains this past week? Any clues anyone?
Thank you
Blue

 

We recently bought a small blueberry bush which we have in a pot. After getting it I read up on the care of them and they seem to have a number of sensitivites. The first thing is that they require a slightly acidic soil (about pH 4.5 to 5) Also they don't like lime so apparently it's best not to water them with tap water but rather use collected rain water if possible which is already slightly acidic.

The other things I discovered (in Alan Titchmarsh's The Kitchen Gardener) is that they benefit from heavy mulching with a well-rotted acidic mulch such as pine needles or bracken.

They also benefit from a symbiotic relationship with mycorrhizal fungus. This can be purchased in sachets and should be placed at the bottom of the planting hole to sit under the root ball. It just needs to sit under the roots and shouldn't be mixed in with the soil. Unfortunately I discovered this after we had re-potted our bush and as it's now fruiting I'm loathe to disturb it put some in.

Another consideration is that they require a lot of water during fruiting lest they die due to water stress.

 

I realise that blueberry bushes need lots of water. I know rain water is the best. We have had a dry spell for a while now, and instead of our bushes dying of thirst I water them with tap water.
We have no room for a water butt.

 

If you live in a soft water area you'll probably be ok, it's the calcium/lime in hard water that the plants don't like. One thing you can do to help is to fill your watering can and leave it to sit for a day before using the water - I read somewhere that this helps the chlorine evaporate.