Blueberries have very specifuc growing requirements.

1. Soil pH must be maintained and adjusted within a very specific range. They do best where the pH is between 4.5 and 5.0. Most people attempting to grow bluberries in So Cal will fail for this reason alone. So Cal municipal water supplies and soil are normally quite alkaline.

If you are willing to go to the expense to use the proper soil mix and adjust your water pH you will have better chances of success. "Azalea Mix" from your garden center may be a good place to start. Water pH can be lowered with acid.

2. Minimum number of chilling hours required for fruit production:
highbush 900 to 1,000 hours below 45 degrees
southern highbush 150 to 500 hours below 45 degrees

Make sure to choose varieties that require less chilling hours.

Like hoovb, I have had good results with the Southern Highbush varieties. I started growing my blueberries in 2004 and they are still going strong. I am sunset zone 22, about 6 miles from the coast. We get about 200-300 hours of chill in an average year where I live. However, I have not tried growing blueberries in pots.

I tried O'Neal, Misty, and Sunshine blue my first years growing blueberries, but O'neal and Misty weren't as attractive of plants and got much taller/ ganglier than sunshine. My blueberries are in the front yard in the rose bed, so they needed to be good looking. After two years of trying all 3, I only kept the sunshine blue. It has thrived since it is near a sprinkler emitter in my front yard and gets regular water, unlike the rest of my yard. The sunshine blue also seems to be self fertile because there have not been any other varieties grown in my neighborhood other than sunshine blue since I took out the Misty and the O'neal in 2006.

When I first planted, I amended the soil with sulfur and mixed peat moss in with the native soil. I picked all the flowers off the first year so it would put the energy into growth instead. The second year, I picked about a pint berries on that plant. Most years I get a little less than a quart or so of berries. It might be producing more, but all the neighborhood kids know it is there too and help themselves sometimes. Usually we can start picking the blueberries around Mid May.

I add a little more sulfur each year in the early spring along with compost. I try not to disturb the root zones.

I, too, have Sunshine Blue. I use grape vine Bare Hands Bird Netting to keep the birds off!! Stay away! These berries are MINE!!

I use polyon 22/2/11 heat activated fertilizer, I dump coffee grounds on them regularly, and I hit them with vinegar water now and then. They are loaded with berries, and I live in the HOT desert!

{{gwi:525739}}

I just ran across an article in the LA Times that may be of some interest.

Here is a link that might be useful: LA Times Article about California blueberries

I'm about 8 blocks from the beach.(Huntington Beach) Most mornings I can't tell if it rained the night before because of the ocean mist.
I also have the Sunshine Blueberry and it is great! I have mine in pots. I also have a Misty.
Misty ripens 1st for me closely follwed by Sunshine.
I have a lot of birds in yard, never have seen them pick at any of my berries. Strawberries, blackberries, raspberries, & boysenberries. I also have a bird feeder maybe that's why?

This morning I took my usual stroll through my vineyard, and noticed one HUGE almost purple blueberry. My berries are on the vineyard drip system because they need a lot of water like the vines.

The variety is O'neal. There was only one! I looked at it. It looked at me. Finally, I popped it in my mouth! YUM!! That was a very BIG blueberry. I may take some cuttings, and put these little berries in some other places where they will be in solid ground, not containers!

The Sunshine Blue has berries, but not ripe yet.

NO! don't you dare plant a blueberry in So Cal. You will start off by planting one or two in containers. Once you sample a few ripe ones and how much better they taste than store bought you will have to multiply them. Next you will dedicate an area in your yard that you will make into a raised bed just perfect for them. You will eat so many tasty blueberries that you will look like the girl from the original Charlie and the chocolate factory.

haha

They do taste way sweeter than store bought though. here is a pic of one of mine just starting to ripen.

{{gwi:525740}}

I have Southmoon, Oneal, Misty and Sharpblue in my garden. Oh yea, I am in Canyon Country, about 30 miles North of LA.

How many blueberries should I expect if I grow one? Maybe, I'm just a greedy pig, but less than a quart per plant seems small to me.

I'm curious about the difference between growing just one and growing two different varities, as in how much of a difference that will make in fruit production. I was just planning on getting just one blueberry, but further research indicates that its best to get two different types.

Sorry to bump an old thread, but I also grow blueberries in SoCal. We get practically no winter chill here, and I've found that there are varieties that don't need as much as 'they' say. Thanks to GardenWeb several years ago I made contact with an L.A. fruit and nut garden club 'group buy' (I don't think that exists anymore) of blueberry plants and purchased Star, Emerald, Jewel, Biloxi, Misty and a few others. I also have SharpBlue and O'Neal. My best varieties are Emerald, Jewel, Misty, Southmoon, and Biloxi. Next are Star, SunshineBlue and Sharpblue. I would not waste my money again on O'Neal - too few fruits and an unattractive plant. If you look around, some of the better varieties are beginning to show up at nurseries. Last year I saw Jewel and Southmoon at a local place. Unfortunately many on-line nurseries cannot ship the better varieties to California.

These are all Southern Highbush varieties. I would have loved to have gotten my hands on some rabbiteye varieties that are supposed to do well here, but didn't know about them while I had access to the group ordering. Oh well.

Be careful, growing blueberries is addicting. I now have about 50 plants, all in containers (15 to 20 gallon). The mix is straight compost, but I do acidify the water about weekly. With so many plants in larger containers, I did not want to spend the $ on azalea mix, but with just a few plants, I would have. To acidify, I use either dilute vinegar, new 'battery' acid (sulfuric), or dry citric (ordered and purchased at an ag place). The citric is the easiest - just periodically sprinkle a bit of it around and then water. The sulfuric is the most effective, but you have to be careful and know how to work with chemicals.

Last year with about 30 producing plants, I harvested over 200 pounds of berries. Birds can be a problem here, but there are so many berries now, I no longer try to cover the plants - there are enough for us all. I have used flashing bird tape which helps for a few weeks until they get used to it.

This year there could be many more berries since there are now 20 more bearing-age plants. I had been removing their flowers till now.

This past year I pruned heavily for the first time removing about half the plant, and was worried I had removed too much. But the plants have responded better than expected, like weeds, and they look healthier than ever.

sweet_lemon, I've read that blueberries are weeds... I just wish they needed as little coddling as weeds do to stay happy.

Your success with blueberries in containers is encouraging. We grow ours in a mix of small bark, peat, and a little perlite.

How much do you dilute the vinegar? I'd much prefer using that over the chemicals.

When I use vinegar, I use about one cup per 32 gallons of tap water (one garbage can full). So that's about a half tablespoon per gallon of water.

When I give my plants their acidic drink, I almost always add a bit of water soluble fertilizer in a small dose. And that's at least once per week. I will use either straight ammonium sulfate or sometimes that mixed with some MiracleGro for trace minerals. Occasionally I'll also add some epsome salts. I add about 1/3 Cup fertilizer per 32 gallons acidic water. That is roughly about 1/2 tsp fert per gallon of water. Very weak, but it's often, and it seems to work very well for my container blueberries.

I have sunshine and misty. I was told to get 2 different varieties to increase production. One plant looks terrible, but the other is green and healthy. The terrible one is the one that has berries, however. I have seen a mockingbird steal them. Mine grow in pots on a shaded patio. They were planted in a blend of camellia mix and cactus mix. I sometimes throw my old tea bags on the soil to bump up the ph.

Here is a link that might be useful: What's Growing On?

Despite DWN's marking otherwise, Sharpblue is a rabbiteye variety.

I have pH 6.8 tap water (municipal). One cup of apple cider vinegar per 5 gal. drops the pH to 4.5.

Soil is a fairly good buffer so this will not lower the pH any...just maybe keep it happy stasis. You have to adjust it with elemental sulfur [slow], or sulfuric acid (above)[instant, but if you break the buffering capacity--it plummets to around pH 1-- I'd dump the soil and start over rather than adding sodium hydroxide to raise the pH back up.

Elemental sulfur will take several weeks to lower the pH, but once established only a bit added every once in a while maintains low pH. Of course this is for soil that starts neutral or alkaline.

We have a little garden next to our garage wall. To mix things up, and because I thought it would be fun to have fresh berries, I decided to plant some blueberries in a large wine barrel containers from Anawalt lumber since everyone said if you grow blueberries in Socal, it's best not to grow them in the ground.

The three varieties I have are Sunshine Blue (now flowering and pretty), O'Neal (not flowering and tall but sparse) and Pink Lemonade (a new variety that is pretty and flowering as well).

I'm especially excited about the Pink Lemonade and I'll let y'all know how the three turn out. I picked them because they're different seasons - one is very early, mid, and then a late one - so I'd have blueberries for a long period of time instead of a ton at one. I was also told even the ones that self-pollinate would fruit better planted with friends ;)

Blueberries in a half barrel grow very well in So. CA. The barrels don't heat up like black 15 gallon pots do. Morning sun is best if you have it.

I got sunshine blue blueberries from HD last week, they are selling it for $7.97/ea. I got 5 of them. Two went in my front yard planters, and three will go in my backyard.

behlgarden, you will have great difficulties growing blueberries directly in the ground in S. Calif (you don't say where you are exactly in S. Calif). You are better off putting them in pots, as the posters have all shown in this thread. You can sink your pots in the ground if you want. Our soil pH is just too high for blueberries to survive. Included a good link for you on how to grow blueberries in Calif.

Patty S.

Here is a link that might be useful: DWN: How to Grow Blueberries in Containers

I an in Corona Area and am planting blueberries in masonry raised planters so once I treat the planter soil with sulfur I believe PH will stay put, as long as I keep treating it with Espoma garden sulfur. I also plan to use vineger to make soil acidic. I will see how these turn out. I dont like to grow anything in pots when I got 1/3 acre of flat space that gets watered about 9800 SF area. I might as well get some fruits out of my water bill, LOL

Yesterday I picked up Misty variety, now I will mix misty with sharpblue and see how it goes. Sharpblue I heard stays evergreen.