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Blueberries topping a Pavlova does assuage a little guilt after indulging in this decadent sugar-rich dessert.
The purple fruit is full of nature’s goodness.
It is praised as a super food packed with powerful antioxidants, vitamins and minerals with disease protection powers like no other.
Blueberries promote heart health, bone strength, skin health, blood pressure improvement, diabetes management, cancer prevention, anti-ageing, improved resilience against dementia and in supporting mental health generally.
Little tubs of blueberries available in the grocery store are a costly treat — so consider growing your own.
Blue Delite Nursery in Wilderness grows the plants especially for home growers and farmers. They may be ordered online.
A berry bush lasts for 20 years. Plus they grow out of their crown, which means the plant keeps renewing itself, making it a long-term investment in your health too.
Blue Delite Nursery’s story began six years ago after Lydia and Alwyn de Waal attended the Berry Festival in Parys.
The couple duly came home inspired to plant a few blueberry bushes for themselves. However they found it extremely difficult to source the plants.
The De Waals, both chartered accountants, who had moved to Wilderness four years previously, shrewdly identified this as a possible untapped market.
Like them, it would supply home growers and farmers with blueberry plants as well as those who did not wish to plant royalty blue berries which came as a premium with conditions attached.
“Our first advert was in the Farmers Weekly five years ago,’’ Lydia said, and since then they haven’t looked back.
Through continuous research on the product, the couple learnt to propagate and grow the blueberries and with the added expertise of two experienced horticulturists on staff, their collective knowledge has grown.
Blueberries are fruiting shrubs that bear fruit from late spring to late summer, depending on the cultivar and variety.
They can be grown in the home garden with little effort and great pleasure.
A single blueberry bush can yield up to 4kg fruit in one season by year five.
Your blueberry shrub will grow about 1m wide by 1.5m tall.
Blueberries — which hail from North America — can grow anywhere provided their requirements are met and the cultivar you grow is correctly suited to your weather conditions.
Lydia gladly shared some pointers with us; especially as now until November is a good time to plant blueberry bushes
“The plants grow in their roots now at this time of year so they are settled in when they start growing vegetatively in spring.”
Soil
Blueberries require a well-drained acidic soil with low or no clay content.
You cannot use chicken manure in the soil.
Be careful not to damage your plant’s roots when transplanting from the container you bought it in.
It is recommended to mulch around the stem of the plant as the surface roots of blueberries are very shallow and can dry out in the sun.
The plant’s roots are fine and grow around the top and rarely grow deeper than a metre.
Water
The most important aspect of blueberry farming is good water. It must be low in salt.
Rainwater is the best for any plant, but if you are in an area where rain is scarce you should water your blueberry plant with about a cup of water three times a week during growing season. It is important not to over water. Keep the soil moist, not wet.
Gradually increase the amount to two litres by the time the plant is five years old.
Position
Blueberry plants require at least eight hours of sunlight a day. They will not grow well in full shade.
In hotter areas, grow the plants under 20 to 30% shade cloth.
“If you live in a very hot area, grow the plants where there is dappled shade from the hot afternoon sun,” Lydia said.
“Don’t plant them near a wall as the heat from the sun reflects against the wall, making it even hotter.”
Can you grow blueberry bushes in pots?
You can grow blueberries directly in the soil or in pots.
They grow well in 20-litre containers in an acidic well-draining medium.
Use a mixture of 60% rough bark, 20% perlite and 20% compost for potting soil.
Make sure there are extra drainage holes and that your pot is lifted from the ground.
Make sure to check the drainage holes regularly as waterlogged roots are fatal to any blueberry plant.
Feeding
The best time to start feeding your blueberry plant is in late spring.
It is advisable to give it a good feeding every three weeks, until late summer when the plant goes into dormancy for the colder months.
Your local garden centre will supply you with a balanced fertiliser for acid-loving plants.
A liquid fertiliser is recommended, as you want the feeding to go directly to the roots. If you opt for food for acid-loving plants, halve the dosage until your plant is mature.
Be careful of overfeeding.
After-care
After you have harvested your blueberries and the plant starts going into winter dormancy, you can give it a light prune.
Try to prune away thin, inferior shoots as well as doing a light tip prune.
You can replace some of the deteriorated organic mulching around the stem again at this time too.
Berries grow on new branches, so take care that you don’t trim away new growth. Try not to spray poisons on the plant — especially when they are fruiting.
Propagation
Propagation is best through tissue culture. You can grow the plant from cuttings but the plant will stay the same age as the plant from which you took the cuttings.
The seed is very small and blueberries grown from it are fairly tasteless.
• In the Garden is written by feature writer, garden enthusiast and former teacher Julia Smith, who has returned home to live in Chintsa East. The column looks to inform both novice and accomplished gardeners on how to make the most of their green patches.
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