nutty:

What variety do you have? This could be a pollination issue. Most of the Southern Highbush set without pollination. Frost could also be the issue.

I would agree with fruitnut, if it had lots of blossoms then it should now have berries.......assuming of course the flowers were pollinated.

I live in the state of Washington and all of my plants have been blooming for three weeks but its been so cold here (days in the 50s, nights at or near freezing) that the bees aren't out. Like yours, I fear my plants this year will have very little fruit.

I'm curious, did you happen to notice if the plant had bees on it when it was blooming?

RM

I've seen the same thing on my Rabbiteyes versus Southern Highbush. I have a good fruit set on my Southern Highbush, but not so on my Rabbiteyes. I was worried of the blooms not being in sync with the bees, because I saw very little bees while in bloom. On my stone fruit trees I go out with a paint brush and manually pollenate them when don't see pollinators. I don't see how I can do that with the blues, but maybe someone can educate me on that.

I have two, the one is Southern Highbush and I don't know what the other one is. The Southern Highbush has less than the other one and it didn't seem to grow all that well. I don't have a problem with frost as I live in Southern California.

Not sure about the bees, I'm at work during the day, so I don't see what's going on during the day.

I read some forums that some water them every day or every other day? I was only watering once a week if even that. Maybe i need to water it more? Although it did have a ton of flowers on them, just not much fruit :(

After reading a bit more, I thinking that maybe I don't have a problem with the soil or growth of the tree since it did produce A LOT of flower blossoms...so could it just be a pollination issue as to why I had so many blossoms but barely any fruit? Or is that not the right logic?

Also, as I mentioned, I have a friend 2 miles away that is already picking his crop and he had hundreds on his plants, none of mine are even ripe yet.

So, not sure what I'm doing wrong...

nutty:

Get a variety like Emerald, Jewel, or Sweetcrisp. They will set without pollination and ripen early like your friend's.

Here is a link that might be useful: Low chill blueberry pictures

Hi fruitnut,
Thanks for the tip. I don't know if I've ever seen Emerald, Jewel, or Sweetcrisp, I'll have to look next time I go to the nursery and pick one up.

With regard to my friend's, I believe he got the southern high bush and misty blue, same ones as me. That's why I"m confused as to why he has so many blueberries and eating them already and I barely have any and none that are ripe. Do you suspect it's the pollination issue since I did have so many flower blossoms, but not much fruit?

nutty:

Lots of flowers and no fruit could be pollination, frost, or way way too dry. But you should have noticed something wrong if it were water. My southern highbush have always set even when in my greenhouse without bees.

I have this problem with 2 varieties (Northsky and Chippewa), but my Briteblue highbush sets fruit fine. They're all right next to each other. Maybe I have no bees. They were all planted in 2007. It's making me so sad. Does anyone hand pollinate? I would be heart broken to have to pull these out and start over with self-pollinating ones.

I have two Chippewas and two Rekas in pots that are starting their 3rd year. The Rekas are loaded by the chippewas have a fair number of berries too. I had almost zero bees all spring this year, too cold.

I took this photo just yesterday of the Chippewa, if you look closely you can see the berries on it.

The chippewa is one of my favorite varieties, Reka is my favorite.

Here is a link that might be useful:

My experience with blueberry pollination here in Madison has been that to maintain a large, varied, and healthy bee population, you have to grow native flowers, and maintain the lawn with out weedkiller or other pesticides. The bees will move in and take care of pollination with no human intervention, given a chance.

Unfortunately, I grow in containers on a roof in manhattan, so bees may be more difficult to attract here than in the suburbs. Besides hand pollinating, I think the only thing I could try doing is starting my own hive and hoping those bees like my bushes!