Blueberry plant not growing.

[jferlisi]

Hi everyone, i am new to this site. I found it thru BYC. So im inquiring about my blueberry plant. I planted it about 4-5 months ago and its not growing. Its not dying either tho. My raspberry plant that i planted at the same time has taken off but my blueberries nothing. I live in socal so could that be it. Will it grow in the winter? I will get pics of it up later but atm im at work.

 

[NwMtGardener]

Blueberries like acidic soil...have you tested your pH? You can buy a test kit to check your soil, then depending on what the pH is there now, you could add aluminum sulfate to lower the pH. the bag will say how much to add to a specific amount of soil to lower the pH a specific amount. Or you could be less scientific and do what I do...sprinkle a cupful around my plants in spring and in July!

And welcome

 

[jferlisi]

Blueberries like acidic soil...have you tested your pH? You can buy a test kit to check your soil, then depending on what the pH is there now, you could add aluminum sulfate to lower the pH. the bag will say how much to add to a specific amount of soil to lower the pH a specific amount. Or you could be less scientific and do what I do...sprinkle a cupful around my plants in spring and in July!

And welcome

What about putting chicken poo around it?

 

[silkiechicken]

Not sure about so cal, but up in wa/or, blueberries turn red in fall and lose their leaves for dormancy all winter. About april or may is when they start to show life again with leaves/flowers. Your little guy just might be stressed still from planting out. As for acidic soil... that is pretty much what we normally have in the PNW, so just mulch with peat moss in the spring to hold water near their shallow roots.

 

[NwMtGardener]

Ummm, someone else around here will be able to tell you more about chix poo, the only thing I know is that you definitely wouldn't want to use it fresh, you would want to age it for a while, like compost it for a couple months to avoid burning the plants. I'm not sure if it would qualify as acidic?? Or acidic enough... I think I remember correctly that blueberries like it as low as 4.5 pH. I mean, aged poo couldn't hurt tho, but I guess I would do both - add an acidic amendment to your soil, as well as aged poo.

 

[yubafarm]

I am no expert, but I've read that blueberries grow slowly. I planted mine last spring and they didn't grow much during the first year. This spring they grew a little bit (not much) but they look healthy and happy and are producing fruit. I don't know what can be done to get them to grow faster but they will never grow as fast as a raspberry - not even close.

 

[jferlisi]

See this is the dying branch of the raspberry bush

Here is the whole bush and you can see the two that are growing like crazy,

And here is my blueberry bush.

 

[nachoqtpie]

I'm not an expert by any way shape or form... but we did put in a blueberry bush this year and while it hasn't done a whole lot of growing yet (It was literally 3 sprigs less than an inch from the ground and is now about 4 inches tall on each of the 3 branches) the plant looks really healthy and for me it's still got the entire season to grow yet! I didn't really expect them to have any fruit this year anyways.

 

[Stubbornhillfarm]

IMHO, comming from a blueberry state, they do grow pretty slowly. Especially in comparrison to a raspberry bush. I am sure you will have to trim back, dig up, etc the raspberry bush many times before you would ever think of the blueberry bush as being too big! Based on your picture, it certainly looks healthy and happy. Keep up the good work!

 

[Northernrose]

I think your blueberry looks pretty healthy. I always think about this saying about newly planted shrubs and trees:

The first year they "sleep"
The second year they "creep"
The third year they "leap"

So, just wait a bit and they should respond with good growth

Trisha