It is time to feed our young blueberry plants. How should we feed them? This link shows the fertilizer I need is the one I feed every one of my crop fields with. That is Ammonium Sulfate. That blend of fertilizer with calcium in the soil or added calcium feeds most crops as well as I know to. This program has worked for me but blueberries are a little different.
They like acid soil.
"Sunlight - Fruit need plenty of sunlight, whenever it begins to branch or bramble.
Soil - Almost all fruits do best in slightly acidic soil, somewhere between a pH of 5.5 and 6.5. Blueberries prefer a soil of even greater acidity of between 4.09 and 5.0.
Drainage - Adequate drainage is important. Find a suitable site, avoiding low lying areas the collect water or are slow to drain in the spring. Ours are situated on a ridge right above a 15 foot or so drop.
Pollination - Most fruit trees, including blueberries have both male and female organs on the same flower, but not all are self pollinating. The best bet for blueberries is to have different varieties of blueberries within 100 feet, so bees can travel and cross pollinate. Blueberries cannot be fertilized by their own pollen "
This piece made a lot of sense to me. ""If you're lucky enough to have a pH of between 4.5 and 5.5, then you can grow blueberries all day long," he says. "But most don't, so you really need to add an amendment that acidifies the soil." To do that, he suggests cottonseed meal or blood meal."
This one says about the same thing. "Native to eastern North America, blueberries thrive in soil conditions that suit rhododendrons and azaleas, to which they are related. Plants require sun and moist, well-drained acid soil (pH 4.5-5.5). Where soil pH isn’t acidic enough, create proper conditions by adding sulphur and sphagnum peat moss."
I will pick up a bucket of ammonium sulfate from my fertilizer dealer and a big bag or two of spanghum peat moss and start from there. I will update you from time to time.
Ed
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