Blueberry plant question...

[catjac1975]

I planted a blueberry a number of months ago and unfortunately I think I forgot to water it in the heat of the summer. I'm in the northern Los Angeles county high desert area and it gets kinda hot here from time to time -- I think 107f was about the highest I'm aware of. Anyway, I thought I killed it but kept watering it and it did come back but the leaves are a very odd shade of pale green unlike any blueberry I've ever seen. The breed is Bountiful Blue if I recall. I've got other Bountiful blue's in pots still that I've not put into the ground. The sickly one is planted in acidic soil and I have one of those cheapie PH meters but am leery of trusting its reading. Any ideas on why the leaves on my bush are so pale would be greatly appreciated. ps - the PH meter claimed the soil was not acidic at all.. I do have soil acidifier that I bought and can use that if you believe that is what is lacking. As we move into winter, I'm assuming all the leaves will fall off? The night temps for the next week here are about 30f.

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The first image is the sickly plant with the very pale leaves -- those leaves have been out for more than a month. The 2nd image shows other bountiful blue's nearby and their corresponding leaf color perched over the sickly plants leaves. Yes, the red plastic pot has no bottom -- I cut it off. All soil in there is something akin to Azalea mix

Thoughts?

Blueberries like acidic soil. They lose their leaves around herein the winter. Maybe they are just trying to do the same for you.

 

[RickF]

Perhaps.. All of my blue's are in a state of being nursed back to health. We had a VERY (for here) cold night -- at about 26F and I lost a few plants -- one was a bell pepper that decided to make a duration run of its life -- it was just now getting to putting out a few peppers. I also lost a few eggplants and a few potatoes that had recently sprouted, while other potato's were unscathed or partially damaged. I'm learning about the cold as this is the first time of living in an area that can freeze..

 

[bobm]

RickF ... Google "Fall Creek Nursery " in Oregon. They are a very large wholesale commercial bueberry producer. They have the best information for commercial as well as bakyard blueberry production available.

 

[RickF]

Thanks for that link.. Never heard of them, but they're bookmarked for now for reference. Thanks!!

 

[majorcatfish]

If you use ammonium sulfate, you get both sulfur and nitrogen-they are needed by both-plus you acidity the soil.

hate to say this but @seedcorn hit the nail on the head........ammonium sulfate is in order, plus get those poor blueberries out of those pots and into the ground like @thistlebloom said with lots of mulch...

to water them use the water from your a/c unit....

 

[RickF]

Thanks.. Just got home and checked in my garage and I've just got a nice big sack of ammonium sulfate (~20lb) ready to go.. Thoughts on how much to apply?

Yes, I'll be transplanting the blue's real soon. I've got 6CF of Amend to apply to the holes I dig -- double-wide/deep is my plan as the "soil" here is very poor desert dirt that gets so compacted after years of disuse.. I also need to get a bag of peat moss.. Peat will help with making the soil a bit more acidic right? Once upon a time I had a "recipe" to make good blueberry potting mix which I know had a decent amount of peat moss but other stuff too that I no longer recall and I can't find the recipe anymore. Doh!

Eventually, I'll be BTE'ing the area that the berries go into (back to eden). I've got to call around to the big tree trimmers in the area to see what I can get.. I recently removed more than a full-sized pickup bed worth of red lava rock that had been in place all over my front yard for the past 20+ years and was full of debris -- all gone now. Ready for some nice soil amendments! I'll post before/after photos of the transplants for your inspection.. I'll probably do it before the weekend is out..

 

[RickF]

ok.. just wanted to post a few pics of my area and what I'm doing to it.. I dug out about a pickup truck bed full of dirt from the aforementioned planter. The planter had more dirt towards the center and it gently sloped down as it reached the edges of the concrete. This is in my front yard. I'm removing at least 6" deep of "soil" -- I quoted that word because the soil is pretty poor quality -- there were places were the shovel wouldn't penetrate and I had to get a pick-axe out to whack it a bit.. Enjoy.. I've got to scare up a 3CF bag of Peet moss.. My local Lowes carries this puny little bag for about $5 that has something like 8 cups.. Ugg.. For the love of a decent garden center.


The above picture shows more or less most of the area that I'm working right now. The tree will eventually be removed. Its a sycamore that's seen better years, but still alive -- but running roots every which way. I'd ultimately love to plant a fruit tree there at some point. Notice next to the wheel barrow what I initially started excavating -- perhaps 6" deep give or take. Later I moved to the far side of the wheelbarrow against the concrete as that's where I want to plant the blueberries.


The above shot is a work-in-progress pile of what I started -- I ended up with a good 4-5 more feet in that pile. Now if someone would answer my craigslist ad and take it away!!


So -- this is the pic showing that "far-side" of the wheelbarrow I mentioned above -- looking out towards the street view. I've dug at least 8" down against the concrete. Some of that dirt is like granite -- hard.. Soaking makes it so much nicer to dig but takes a while to soak in.. Luckily I had run new sprinkler lines for a future drip system.. About 18" below that trench lies 1 1/4" water lines that supply the entire irrigation systems in the front & back yards... This area that's excavated above will hold the blueberries -- it's probably close to 15' long from front to back if you will .. I'll probably put all 4 berries there and backfill with wood chips on top as deep as I can make it..

 

[bobm]

The commercial blueberry fields use sawdust to spread around the bushes from the saw MILLS .. Do NOT use the sawdust from cabinet shops as they contain melamine plastic from the plywood that they use to build the cabinets with.

 

[catjac1975]

That big tree is pretty close.

 

[RickF]

That tree will eventually be removed -- it's a sycamore -- which for whatever reason are super common out here. They drop their dingle-balls all over the ground which makes a bigger mess than the leaves. lol. I've got a bunch of trees that need to be removed. I think this small ~5500SF property has 3 sizable pine trees, two ash (one alive, one dead), and 5-6 sycamore's. I'd love to switch over to trees that provide fruit or at least decent shade without piles of pine needles. Anyway, one step at a time..