How to Grow Blueberries? A Detailed Guide to the Latest Planting Methods

The blueberry is a blue fruit that is deeply loved by everyone for its particularly sweet-and-sour taste and excellent flavor. Its seeds are very tiny, and you can swallow them straight down with hardly any sensation at all, so people generally just swallow blueberries whole without spitting out the seeds. A blueberry itself is only about the size of a cherry, yet its flavor is wonderful. So how do you grow blueberries? Let Shuishuai explain it to everyone below!

1. Choosing Seedlings

For choosing seedlings, you can directly select two- to three-year-old blueberry seedlings, as these can bear fruit faster. If you start cultivating from the very first seedling stage, it may take several years before fruit is produced, so this step of choosing seedlings is very important. If the seedlings are not chosen well, it may prolong the growth cycle and the profit cycle, creating extra costs. In addition, when choosing seedlings you must pick ones free of disease, filter out all the seedlings that are growing poorly or are not robust, and keep only the seedlings with good growth and no disease for planting out.

2. Orchard Site Construction

1. Choosing the site

When choosing a site, try to choose land with a gentle slope. In addition, blueberry roots are relatively shallow and very fine, so the soil should preferably not be too compact, and it should have good permeability, so as to favor the development and absorption of the blueberry root system. Choose slightly acidic soil.

2. Planting out

Strawberries can be planted out in spring or autumn, but the survival rate for autumn planting is far higher than for spring planting. Spring planting can only be early, not too late. Different blueberry varieties have different plant and row spacings, so just plant according to the corresponding spacing for each. If you use mixed planting of multiple varieties, you can greatly increase the fruit set rate and the quality of the blueberries.

3. Soil Management

1. Clean cultivation

Clean cultivation can begin from August in early spring; carrying out clean cultivation again after the Start of Autumn is very unfavorable for overwintering. Highbush blueberries often use clean cultivation.

2. Sod culture

Compared with clean cultivation, sod culture is also beneficial for increasing yield, and it can maintain soil moisture very well, which is very favorable for machine plowing.

3. Weeding

Do not underestimate this detail of weeding; weeding is very important. If there are too many weeds, they will compete with the land for nutrients, so this step of weeding can double the yield. Weeding mainly uses herbicides; spraying chemicals costs much less than manual weeding, and the efficiency is much higher.

4. Soil mulching

Soil mulching means covering lowbush blueberries with 5-10 cm of leaves, which can enrich the organic matter in the soil, maintain soil moisture, and inhibit the rampant growth of weeds.

4. Fertilization

1. Types of fertilizer

Blueberries mainly rely on nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium fertilizers, in a ratio of nitrogen to phosphorus to potassium of 1:1:1. Applying nitrate nitrogen fertilizer is prohibited, and applying chlorine-containing fertilizers such as ammonium chloride is also prohibited.

2. Fertilization method and timing

Highbush blueberries and rabbiteye blueberries are generally fertilized by the furrow application method, while lowbush blueberries are fertilized by broadcasting.

5. Irrigation

As mentioned earlier, blueberry roots are distributed relatively shallowly and prefer moisture, so watering is very important. Do not use water with a high pH for irrigation; irrigate with acidic water, once every 3-5 days.

The above covers how to grow blueberries. Growing blueberries still requires a certain amount of technical skill. If you are thinking of planting them, it is best to consider it carefully before starting, and ideally to have experienced hands on board; otherwise, if they are not grown well, you will suffer losses. I hope this article can help everyone. To learn more related information, please continue to follow Qinnong Web!