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Bountiful Blueberries · In the Garden with UC Master Gardeners

• 0:21
  SPEAKER_02: This is In the Garden, a show produced by the UC Master Gardeners of Orange County.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_02: I'm David Laterno, your DJ for the hour.
• 0:29
  SPEAKER_02: This week's topic is bountiful blueberries.
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_02: My guest is Romero Lobo.
• 0:35
  SPEAKER_02: Welcome, Romero.
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_02: And let's talk about what you do in the garden.
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_02: You've been doing a lot of blueberry uh research projects recently, I think, and that's how we met over at the University of California's uh research center over in Irvine.
• 0:52
  SPEAKER_02: What got you there and what's what's kind of your background?
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_02: Where how did this all start?
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you, David.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_01: Um, as you mentioned, my name is Ramiro Lobo.
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_01: I am officially a farm advisor with the University of California and affiliated with the University of California Small Farm Center located out of Davis.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_01: Uh as part of our geo responsibilities, we do research on crops that are common to the locations where we are.
• 1:18
  SPEAKER_01: And in this case, uh blueberries, as you mentioned, is one of the crops that we've been researching for the last several years.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_01: It's been uh blueberries has been a fascinating story.
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_01: It's been a crop that uh for us involved with the agricultural industry, we wish we had one like every 10 to 20 years just because of the impact that is had in agriculture statewide.
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_01: Uh to give you a little bit of history, uh California, we've had blueberries in California for forever, pretty much.
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_01: But uh what we used to grow in the state were the northern type blueberries, which usually grows well in the northern part of the state, you know, in cooler, colder climates.
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_01: Since the uh mid-90s, uh there's been a lot of effort to breed new blueberries that adapt better to warmer climates, and so that's what gave start to what's called southern high bush blueberries, which opened up a lot of opportunities for us to grow them in California.
• 2:17
  SPEAKER_01: We know blueberries like acidic soil, so initially people used to say there is no way you can grow blueberries in California.
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_01: But I guess you tell uh California that they cannot do something and they will prove you wrong, and that's been the story with blueberries.
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_01: So, again, to give you a little bit of uh background, way back in 1998, uh Manuel Jimenez, which is a colleague of mine located in the uh Tulare County in the Central Valley, along with Mark Askell and then favored in Ventura and Santa Barbara County, started out playing with blueberries.
• 2:50
  SPEAKER_01: And uh at that time California didn't even factor in as a blueberry producing state in uh in the USDA agricultural statistics.
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_01: But uh today we've surpassed uh New Jersey and or Michigan as the number one producer, and we are number one in blueberries grown domestically in the U.S.
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_01: uh as part of our initial research, we tried out a number of blueberry varieties that were available uh and pretty much at about 25 different locations throughout the state, just to find varieties that would fit the microclimate.
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_01: Uh what guided our interest was to do research we did in the market end of things, and we saw a huge gap in the uh in the market reports out of the LA wholesale terminal market, that there was a clear market window in mid-April, you know, that uh that was uh where the prices were high and the supply were low, and that's sort of uh the target was to grow blueberries and be ready at the market at that time.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_01: During that window.
• 3:51
  SPEAKER_01: During that market window.
• 3:52
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 3:52
  SPEAKER_01: Um there was also a gap in late in the fall, you know, October, November, which is kind of at the tell end of the season.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_01: And so we were trying to hit those windows for, you know, trying to find varieties that would produce in those windows.
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_01: And and so with these Southern High Bush blueberries, there was about twenty, about thirty-two varieties that we tested initially.
• 4:11
  SPEAKER_01: And uh and we found out that uh to our surprise, we were hitting that window right on without any major modifications to the environments.
• 4:21
  SPEAKER_01: I should mention that soil amendments were needed because as you probably know, blueberries like acidic soils, and our soils in in the state are very uh alkaline, so we had to work on the soil before planting anything.
• 4:33
  SPEAKER_01: But uh I would say that uh without any reservation, blueberries has been a great success, both on the commercial end of agriculture and it's become a great plant for home gardeners as well.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_01: And that's uh uh as gratifying because uh it is uh given the health benefits and the popularity of the crop and the prices even at the marketplace, it is great that uh that homeowners can grow blueberries and that they can really produce blueberries almost year-round in their environment because of different varieties that are available.
• 5:03
  SPEAKER_02: It's interesting that you bring it up because I I've uh looking to do citrus planting and trying to overlap with some of the citrus that is grown, so that uh we'll end up with having oranges most of the time the full year cycle.
• 5:17
  SPEAKER_02: Um and I I first you know I'm astounded uh by the fact that I'm from Michigan originally, so you know that seemed to be uh when you look at the climate there, i it's rainy, it's it can be chilly, it just seems like those conditions are so ideal for growing blueberries.
• 5:33
  SPEAKER_02: But now we're seeing uh blueberries in the market all the time.
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_02: I I know a lot of it comes from different countries, but uh I'm astounded to hear that this is actually taking a foothold here in Southern California.
• 5:47
  SPEAKER_02: So how do you deal with uh the temperature that requirements, that chill hours that uh blueberries need?
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_02: Is that a factor or have these been modified in a manner that allows it?
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_01: It is a factor.
• 6:01
  SPEAKER_01: And when I mentioned southern high bush, uh the fact of the matter is the newer varieties that have come out into the marketplace, the chilling requirement has been less and less.
• 6:11
  SPEAKER_01: So when you look at the northern type high bush, probably some of those blueberries require chilling into the probably a thousand hours of chill to produce successfully.
• 6:20
  SPEAKER_01: And right now we're dealing with varieties that almost grow as evergreen in Southern California with a requirement of 200 to 300 chill hours.
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_01: So that makes um which uh makes them really conducive to be grown in the southern part of the state.
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_01: And when we talk about chill hours, it it is the accumulated number of hours below 40 or right at 40 degree temperatures in a season.
• 6:45
  SPEAKER_01: So uh that was part of the uh re early research looking at varieties that uh that were had different chilling requirements, and so we wanted to see which ones did better in different microclimates.
• 6:57
  SPEAKER_01: Some varieties grew well but didn't bloom or didn't produce fruit.
• 7:00
  SPEAKER_01: Others, you know, did uh just wonderfully.
• 7:03
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, some of them even bloomed too early that became fairly risky uh for growing because if you were prone to have a late freeze, as it happened in 2007, I think we had a hard freeze with all our fruit on the blueberry plantings across the southern part of the state were set, and then we had a hard freeze in in on on February of 2007, February 18th, to be excited, I think I remember the date because our field trials just froze.
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_01: We uh all the fruit that we had in our plants was damaged.
• 7:34
  SPEAKER_01: And once you have the fruit set and and it freezes, the fruit just the cells break and that fruit won't continue growing.
• 7:40
  SPEAKER_01: It will be considered a loss.
• 7:42
  SPEAKER_01: If you have flowers, it's okay, and if and the plants are not damaged, they are cold weather plants.
• 7:47
  SPEAKER_01: But the fruit set and then uh exposed to freezing temperature is definitely damaged.
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_02: So but that that has been overcome.
• 7:54
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, as far as the uh temperature issue and chill hours that are necessary.
• 7:59
  SPEAKER_02: Now, if you're a uh if you're a homeowner though, in a home gardener and you're looking to to grow blueberries, what would you suggest to people?
• 8:07
  SPEAKER_02: Because I know when you plant these bushes, unless you have a plant that's at least two years old, maybe three years old, you're you're best to not you're not gonna get much fruit from it.
• 8:19
  SPEAKER_02: And you might weave and wait, uh is my understanding.
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_01: That is correct, but it's not necessarily true.
• 8:25
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, in our experience, whether in pots or in the soil, we find out that blueberries bloom as soon as they hit the ground.
• 8:32
  SPEAKER_01: As a matter of fact, in our earlier efforts to grow them, we used to recommend people to to to knock the flowers off in the first year in an effort to grow the root system.
• 8:42
  SPEAKER_01: But then we realize that uh especially on commercial plantings, you're investing a lot of money on on a planting, so you want to start recovering your investment as soon as possible.
• 8:51
  SPEAKER_01: And if you're a homeowner, you know you want to start enjoying the fruit of your labor as soon as you can, right?
• 8:56
  SPEAKER_02: So in in in our experience that much patience myself.
• 9:00
  SPEAKER_01: In our experience, we find out that uh blueberries are very prolific and very uh uh and they will will f they will produce fruit within a year after planting.
• 9:10
  SPEAKER_01: However, that is if you plant them in the uh say in the fall, which is sort of a or in the spring, you know, because blueberries you can put them in the ground in the spring or fall, or whenever you get them.
• 9:21
  SPEAKER_01: In our environment is so friendly and so conducive to growing plants year-round that it doesn't really make a difference.
• 9:27
  SPEAKER_01: But I would say probably a year after you transplant them, uh spring planting, you may get some flowers in the fall.
• 9:33
  SPEAKER_01: Uh winter, you know, fall planting, you may get some flowers and fall in spring.
• 9:37
  SPEAKER_01: Even if they are little, they will start producing blooms.
• 9:39
  SPEAKER_01: As a matter of fact, most plantings, most plants that I see at uh uh at home garden, garden stores or nurseries that already have flowers in them, in the pot.
• 9:50
  SPEAKER_01: So usually you know you plant them and they already have flowers on them, so it's not a problem.
• 9:55
  SPEAKER_01: The critical the critical thing with with blueberries for home gardeners and commercial growers is manage the soil pH.
• 10:01
  SPEAKER_01: And that is something that you gotta work on before planting because it's gonna be an ongoing battle if you don't do that.
• 10:08
  SPEAKER_01: So what we recommend people is uh if you're planting them in a bed in your house, in your backyard, dig out that soil, add as much mulch, coarse mulch as you can, and then amend the soil with some sort of a sulfur, elemental sulfur in a powder form, on a pellet form, and um and that will help uh prep the soil and probably work uh better than if you don't do I mean it will definitely work better than not doing anything at the start.
• 10:36
  SPEAKER_01: The mulch as it decomposes, it has some acidifying effect on the soil.
• 10:40
  SPEAKER_01: Plus, blueberries uh very fibrous root system and they, you know, from the native habitat, they grow on decay in organic matter, so they love that type of an environment.
• 10:50
  SPEAKER_01: Like pine needle compost is really a good medium to use for pine bark is definitely the best.
• 10:58
  SPEAKER_01: Pine bark mulch why is that?
• 11:00
  SPEAKER_01: Because uh it is uh very acidic.
• 11:03
  SPEAKER_01: And it's more acidic than any other wood that there is out there.
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_01: But since uh we don't really have a lumber industry or timber industry that produces a lot of pine bark here in Southern California, I mean just about any mulch works well.
• 11:16
  SPEAKER_01: What we recommend uh people is you know at planting is to blend uh pit moss with the native soil and the pine bark, and at this time hopefully you've amended the soil with sulfur and then sort of uh blend it all in and then that will buffer the soil environment for blueberries to grow and hit the ground running, as we say.
• 11:35
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 11:36
  SPEAKER_02: And these are these are bushes, they're gonna last you what how many years?
• 11:43
  SPEAKER_01: Most definitely I've seen blueberry northern type blueberries in the uh in the Santa Rosa area that are 60 years old.
• 11:52
  SPEAKER_01: With the northern type uh the the the big difference here is that those blueberries, northern type blueberries in northern in colder climates, they reach dormancy during the winter months.
• 12:03
  SPEAKER_01: So they they they run during the summer and then they rest during the winter.
• 12:08
  SPEAKER_01: We are not seeing that with the southern high bush blueberries grown in Southern California.
• 12:13
  SPEAKER_01: And the reason is they are like I said, they are evergreen.
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_01: So they don't go um they don't drop their leaves, they they stay green pretty much year round.
• 12:22
  SPEAKER_01: It's been a one or two years when I've seen a lot of uh uh uh more defoliation in blueberries during the uh during the winter months, but for the most part we don't really know how long a blueberry plant will last in a this type of an environment because the older planting is only about since 1998, about 15, 8, 18, 20 years old.
• 12:42
  SPEAKER_01: So that's the big difference.
• 12:43
  SPEAKER_01: Uh the other aspect of it, which is being a big factor, is that most people want to manage their blueberries like if they lived in Michigan, as you mentioned, or if they lived in Oregon or or or New Jersey, where where they do pruning in the winter.
• 12:58
  SPEAKER_01: So what I tell people about growing blueberries in their backyard here is to throw away and don't read anything that has to do with blueberries prior to to the early 90s because all the recommendations are gonna be based in the northern states.
• 13:11
  SPEAKER_01: Uh here we prune in the summer.
• 13:13
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, so we prune in the summer soon after you're done with the harvest.
• 13:18
  SPEAKER_01: And the uh the productive season, depending on what variety you grow, you're gonna start picking blueberries as early as January and then uh carry on until June.
• 13:27
  SPEAKER_01: And if you prune uh if you have one of the earlier varieties and if you prune them right after right after you're done with the after you pick the last berry, chances are you may have a crop of blueberries in the fall.
• 13:39
  unknown: Oh wow.
• 13:40
  SPEAKER_01: So that's how different it is here, uh, as opposed to what it is or what people are used to, you know, from uh from what they remember about blueberries in their in their whatever they are from.
• 13:52
  SPEAKER_02: And so that brings us to the next question.
• 13:55
  SPEAKER_02: What how do you recommend pruning?
• 13:57
  SPEAKER_02: Because I'm hearing uh you want to take and get rid of some of the old stock to allow the new stock to grow.
• 14:04
  SPEAKER_02: But and then how well I'll let you explain that.
• 14:07
  SPEAKER_01: For for your young plants, what you want really is pretty much bunch your plant.
• 14:12
  SPEAKER_01: That's the plant you get out of the nursery or whatever, just bunch it and use a flat cut.
• 14:18
  SPEAKER_01: You know, you want to cut everything up to a certain height that you want it.
• 14:21
  SPEAKER_02: Uh leaving about a third of the plant.
• 14:24
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I would say probably more.
• 14:25
  SPEAKER_01: Uh probably take leave two-thirds of the plant and remove the top third.
• 14:30
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 14:31
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, yeah, repo remove the top third and leave the two-thirds below.
• 14:35
  SPEAKER_01: As your plants grow, uh, the same principle applies to pruning blueberries.
• 14:39
  SPEAKER_01: As the plant is filling up, you want to create a vase shape, like an inverted funnel shape, and uh and that's kind of the ideal shape.
• 14:47
  SPEAKER_01: Different varieties though would allow you to do that easier than others.
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_01: For example, there are some varieties of blueberries that are more upright, and that's easy to create a kind of a vase shape, whereas there are others that are low spreading bushes, which is kind of hard to pick them off the ground, and that's what you should concentrate on.
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_01: You know, remove the lower branches and start shaping it to train it upright.
• 15:10
  SPEAKER_02: So would there be varieties that you try to avoid from that low standpoint?
• 15:14
  SPEAKER_02: I know from an agricultural standpoint, I think it would probably uh you would want the taller type, but does it it it's it it depends.
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and and and again, it all depends what your your ideal, what your goal is.
• 15:27
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, uh some of the low spreading bushes, if you train them properly, they are very productive, very productive varieties.
• 15:33
  SPEAKER_01: Uh so the productivity is what we're looking for in general.
• 15:38
  SPEAKER_01: And then um but uh I'll touch on I'll expand on this in a little bit, but let me finish the pruning aspect of it.
• 15:44
  SPEAKER_01: When what then when you prune, in addition to creating that vase shape, what you're looking for is you cut down your your your fruiting wood.
• 15:51
  SPEAKER_01: Whatever would produce fruit, you remove that and you cut back to the next strongest shoot that you can find on that branch.
• 16:00
  SPEAKER_01: So you can be as aggressive as you want, or you can leave more material depending where you find that last strong shoot that you want to keep, because that's what's gonna give you fruit the following season.
• 16:10
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 16:11
  SPEAKER_01: So if you want to prune them heavily, you cut back to the to the to the shoots, the strongest shoe that is closer to center.
• 16:17
  SPEAKER_01: By center I mean the core of the plant.
• 16:20
  SPEAKER_01: Uh or you can remove on the periphery and go back to the strong shoot, and then you have multiple shoots on that one branch, and that's how you approach it.
• 16:27
  SPEAKER_01: And again, you're just training the shoots that are upright, you remove branches that are crossing, or you know, branches that are generally um generally weak.
• 16:37
  SPEAKER_01: On young plants, what you have what you you what you will see is that as the plant grows new chutes, when they take off in the ground, there is like what we call the nursery plant, states down low in the center of that plant.
• 16:51
  SPEAKER_01: So in the first year or two, what we recommend is just remove the nursery plant because that will state uh like a really leafy tissue and weak shoots in the center, and the new canes will start growing on the sides of that.
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_01: So you want to remove that from the center and then start training your plant upright.
• 17:08
  SPEAKER_01: Um back to the varieties.
• 17:10
  SPEAKER_02: The uh the varieties that uh I guess if I ask you this, I'm thinking the seasonality of it.
• 17:17
  SPEAKER_02: Um going back to my sickness example, I'd love to have blueberries year-round.
• 17:22
  SPEAKER_02: I'm not sure if you're gonna have that every month, but if I got eight or ten months versus just one or two months, I'd be a happy camper.
• 17:32
  SPEAKER_02: But does that entail having a uh multiple varieties?
• 17:36
  SPEAKER_01: That is that was gonna suggest that.
• 17:38
  SPEAKER_01: I mean uh yeah.
• 17:39
  SPEAKER_01: The varieties, depending how much space you have in your backyard, you could potentially have a long blueberry season.
• 17:46
  SPEAKER_01: Um like I said, you start with varieties that uh or experience here, and I named some blueberry varieties that may or may not necessarily be available to to backyard growers because some of these are sort of patented and that they're available in large quantities to wholesale nurseries, but not necessarily through retail nurseries.
• 18:04
  SPEAKER_01: But in our field experiment here in the at Southcoast Field Station, we're seeing that variety called Snow Chaser, which is uh up to now one of the earliest varieties.
• 18:14
  SPEAKER_01: It starts uh we start harvesting in mid-January, and then it it goes from mid-January till the end of March.
• 18:22
  SPEAKER_01: And we have two varieties that do that.
• 18:24
  SPEAKER_01: One is uh Snow Chaser and Spring High, and then we have other two varieties that peaks in and start kind of producing in the mid-March and uh and then go until mid to late May.
• 18:36
  SPEAKER_01: And so if you look at varieties and look at the uh low chill uh at early mid or late season, you could easily achieve a long productive season on your blueberries.
• 18:47
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 18:47
  SPEAKER_01: Uh commercial varieties that are fairly early that are being popular among homeowners, you have varieties like a char blue that has been out there is being a really good variety, very vigorous, very productive.
• 18:58
  SPEAKER_01: Misty is another variety, but this tend to be more in the mid-season type.
• 19:02
  SPEAKER_01: And so you can achieve that.
• 19:04
  SPEAKER_01: And and the other aspect, I'm sorry, is that if you prune so pruning in variety can allow you to achieve that G around production.
• 19:15
  SPEAKER_01: So and and and and then again it will be very specific to your own microclimate, which is one of the uniqueness about California.
• 19:21
  SPEAKER_01: You cannot make a recommendation that would apply more than a mile radius from when you're basing that recommendation on because of different uh patterns of topography or or or temperature.
• 19:32
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, temperature and everything else that that comes into play.
• 19:36
  SPEAKER_02: Do most of the when you go to these nurseries to buy blueberry bushes, do they give you a a kind of an idea that as to the well chill always I'm assuming you would assume most of these big box stores would have appropriate blueberry plants for this area.
• 19:53
  SPEAKER_02: But is there uh are they suggesting like well this you'll be able to expect fruit in January or or January to March or whatever it might be?
• 20:03
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, does it get that much detail there?
• 20:05
  SPEAKER_02: Do you have to go to another resource or can you recommend a resource that might be?
• 20:10
  SPEAKER_01: I don't think they will be that specific because again, the different different blueberries will behave differently depending where you are.
• 20:18
  SPEAKER_01: We are finding out that uh like we had uh early on, we had a trial right on the coast, in a very coastal area, and uh and then some other trials inland, and we found out that as we moved uh inland the the season for the same variety changes.
• 20:37
  unknown: Okay.
• 20:38
  SPEAKER_01: For example, we had a variety that would so just to give you an idea, a variety on the coast would be started fruiting or harvesting in in February first, inland in the inland valleys, we would be harvesting February fifteenth, and then if we're farther inland we go, say into the mountain ranges in San Diego County or Valley Center, we would be picking uh pretty much a month later.
• 21:00
  SPEAKER_01: So again, it depends where you are.
• 21:02
  SPEAKER_01: What we're looking in general is is at the shill hours.
• 21:05
  SPEAKER_01: And the risk is you don't want to buy a variety, depending on your microclimate, you don't want to buy a variety that is very low chill hours, because it may or weather patterns change so drastically that we have a warm wave in the winter, your plants will think it's spring and they'll bloom, and then we revert back to winter and you may have a hard freeze and then you lose your crop.
• 21:25
  SPEAKER_01: This is what I was telling you earlier.
• 21:26
  SPEAKER_01: So you want to find a if if you're prone to freeze where you are, probably the safest way to buy like a mid-season variety and not necessarily a very early variety.
• 21:36
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 21:37
  SPEAKER_01: Just to to kind of hatch your your your you know, minimize the risk of losing your crop that way.
• 21:43
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 21:43
  SPEAKER_02: What about pollination?
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_02: Do you are you concerned with that?
• 21:47
  SPEAKER_01: No, not at all.
• 21:47
  SPEAKER_01: Blueberries for the most part are self pollinating.
• 21:50
  SPEAKER_01: Uh we do recommend to have uh as in to put them in sets of two different varieties uh that that are early.
• 21:56
  SPEAKER_01: That way cross pollination helps, but it's not necessary.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_01: So b if if you have uh multiple sets of variety, put two varieties, one of di two different varieties, let's say two early varieties, two mid season varieties, and two late season varieties, and then that way you get, you know, one that cross pollinate the other.
• 22:15
  SPEAKER_01: The other aspect is that as as similar as they are, each variety has a different taste.
• 22:23
  SPEAKER_01: And uh and when you have different varieties and you taste them, one of the things that I tell people is maybe because I haven't I have plenty of blueberries, you know, since I started researching them, I tell people is you never eat blueberries one at a time.
• 22:37
  SPEAKER_01: True.
• 22:38
  SPEAKER_01: So you gotta eat two or three at a time because they that you usually find them at different maturity rates when you harvest them, and or a blend of varieties, and they stimulate your palate a lot better than than just eating one at a time.
• 22:50
  SPEAKER_01: You have multiple expressions of flavor, and I and I and I've uh and it changes the eating experience when you do it that way.
• 22:55
  SPEAKER_02: Well it's interesting that you say that because I've I've been to the store and it's just blueberries.
• 23:00
  SPEAKER_02: There isn't storm chaser, there isn't these other different identifying uh types.
• 23:07
  SPEAKER_02: So I often wonder uh why why why what what happened there?
• 23:12
  SPEAKER_02: You know, that they don't specialize in just having one for idol.
• 23:15
  SPEAKER_01: There is a number of reasons for that.
• 23:17
  SPEAKER_01: And and uh and in related to that related related to that, I'll mention that we uh a colleague of mine, Manuel Jimenez, looked at the uh blueberries are called by the U.S.
• 23:28
  SPEAKER_01: Blueberry Council the Blue Dynamos.
• 23:30
  SPEAKER_01: Meaning it is considered a superfruit and it got it's been well documented that they have high antioxidant activity, right?
• 23:38
  SPEAKER_01: Uh as you would suspect, different varieties would express, would have different antioxid different levels of antioxidant activity.
• 23:48
  SPEAKER_01: So at one point we started suggesting why don't we promote blueberries with higher antioxidant activity.
• 23:54
  SPEAKER_01: But then as a commercial on the commercial end of things, some growers that did not have varieties that were high uh higher on the antioxidant activity, they were saying, What's gonna happen to us?
• 24:07
  SPEAKER_01: Then we're gonna be placed at a disadvantage because only people are gonna start buying the higher antioxidant activity blueberries.
• 24:14
  SPEAKER_01: So that's why by consensus, industry-wide they decided to market blueberries without necessarily identifying the antioxidant activity in them.
• 24:23
  SPEAKER_01: And flavor is the same.
• 24:25
  SPEAKER_01: When we comes to flavor, it's like any other fruit.
• 24:28
  SPEAKER_01: You know, some people will prefer a fruit because it is either sweeter, more tart, or more acidic, or what have you.
• 24:35
  SPEAKER_01: So it it is uh it's hard to emphasize or promote a flavor when there are so many flavor differences.
• 24:44
  SPEAKER_01: And and so that's why when we suggest, and again, it's sort of a joke, but but it is true, you know.
• 24:49
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, with blueberries, it's a fruit so small that you can afford to put two or three or four or a handful in your mouth, depending how how plentiful they are.
• 24:56
  SPEAKER_01: The taste experience and then the taste experience is gonna be different, as if you eat, you know, one at a time of different varieties.
• 25:03
  SPEAKER_01: The other thing is uh on um what you find in the marketplace, uh uh typically it's a blend of varieties.
• 25:11
  SPEAKER_01: You do usually most growers will have two or three varieties going at the same time on a commercial scale.
• 25:16
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, and then it has to do with uh what we talked about earlier, you know, the cross-pollination aspect and uh and the fact that they consolidate from multiple fields, especially larger growers.
• 25:26
  SPEAKER_01: They will grow a number of different varieties that are sort of uh compatible or synchronized in terms of the seasonality.
• 25:33
  SPEAKER_03: Sure.
• 25:33
  SPEAKER_01: And and and um and depending on the season, you will find that a lot of our blueberries uh are imported and usually have been in cold storage for a significant amount of days.
• 25:44
  SPEAKER_02: And then cold storage does affect the flavor.
• 25:46
  SPEAKER_01: It does affect the flavor, yes.
• 25:49
  SPEAKER_01: And it well, it it it depends who you ask.
• 25:51
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I was talking to some importers and they tell me that they've developed technology, or they mentioned that they that they've developed technologies that allow them to bring uh blueberries from Chile and uh and that takes about 17 days to Miami or or 21 days to LA.
• 26:10
  SPEAKER_01: And uh in addition to that, they put them in cold storage for 60 additional days, and they argue that they will taste as fresh as you pick them the day before.
• 26:19
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I'm assuming from uh fruit um shelf life perspective, yeah, the fruit is okay, but something has got to give.
• 26:29
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, we're talking about a fruit that uh no matter how you control the environment, the flavor is gonna be off a little bit to a certain extent.
• 26:36
  SPEAKER_01: And what we're finding more common is that they lose the crunch.
• 26:40
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, uh they are not as crisp, they tend to be a little bit leathery on the skin, and it has to do probably with storage.
• 26:47
  SPEAKER_01: When you eat a fresh blueberry, I mean the snap is part of what makes them really interesting.
• 26:53
  SPEAKER_01: It enhances the experience, yeah.
• 26:54
  SPEAKER_02: And probably activates your taste buttons.
• 26:56
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, yeah, definitely.
• 26:57
  SPEAKER_01: Definitely.
• 26:59
  SPEAKER_02: Um that's interesting.
• 27:01
  SPEAKER_02: I I always wonder, you know, but the bottom line is it's gonna taste better out of your backyard.
• 27:07
  SPEAKER_01: Most definitely, yeah.
• 27:08
  unknown: Yeah.
• 27:09
  SPEAKER_02: So if you're able to pick them and choose them, it's just one of those things.
• 27:12
  SPEAKER_01: Oh no, no question about it.
• 27:14
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, and and I think that's the reward of just being able to relax and go out there and feel like you've accomplished something, and then you get this great reward of these wonderful blueberries.
• 27:25
  SPEAKER_01: Uh no question about it.
• 27:27
  SPEAKER_01: And uh, I mean, a blueberry bush, you know, the uh the higher end of the production scale would probably give you anywhere, you know, six pounds, you know, when a mature plant.
• 27:37
  SPEAKER_01: But if you spread that over several months, you know, or or a couple months, you know, you you get a handful that are enough to eat with your cereal to make a check on a day a shake on a daily basis.
• 27:47
  SPEAKER_01: I think that's very rewarding.
• 27:49
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 27:49
  SPEAKER_01: So it is the uh the pleasure of growing your own plants.
• 27:53
  SPEAKER_02: This is In the Garden show produced by the UC Master Gardeners of Orange County.
• 27:58
  SPEAKER_02: I'm David Laterno, your host, and we're back with Romero Lobo and talking about blueberries.
• 28:06
  SPEAKER_02: So uh what do you think about container gardening for for blueberries?
• 28:11
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, uh you know, we have a lot of people that think because I live in an apartment, I have uh a small balcony or a small area.
• 28:19
  SPEAKER_02: I I can't do as much as someone with a huge backyard.
• 28:23
  SPEAKER_02: But in a lot of cases with vertical gardens that are now becoming popular, people can do some gardening there.
• 28:31
  SPEAKER_02: But I think even these as a as a blueberry bush, if you look at it from that perspective, it gives you a lot of latitude.
• 28:39
  SPEAKER_01: I think blueberries is one of those plants that uh lends very well to be grown in pots, both uh as a buggyer plant or on commercial scales.
• 28:47
  SPEAKER_01: And um as part of my my uh recent research, that's what was one of the aspects that I was looking at, you know, looking at uh trying to get familiar with growing blueberries in pots, and uh and they've been uh did they adapt really well.
• 29:02
  SPEAKER_01: With uh one of the things that we compare was because of the the root system on blueberries, we uh compare like tall pots.
• 29:10
  SPEAKER_01: This is fifteen gallon pots, which I think is ideal size for growing blueberries in containers.
• 29:14
  SPEAKER_01: If you want to put them in a bigger pot, it is fine as well.
• 29:17
  SPEAKER_01: I've seen uh people growing them in uh in in uh whiskey barrels, and they work really well.
• 29:24
  SPEAKER_01: And we suggest that uh if you're using a 15-gallon pot, you go with the shorter, wider pot as opposed to the taller pot or the avocado pot that you see commonly in nurseries and garden centers.
• 29:36
  SPEAKER_02: 12 inch length or maybe 18 inches?
• 29:38
  SPEAKER_01: It is about eighteen inches, and about uh that wide as well.
• 29:42
  SPEAKER_01: About the the the width is about eighteen to twenty-four inches, yeah.
• 29:47
  SPEAKER_01: Excuse me.
• 29:48
  SPEAKER_01: And so uh the reason we suggest that is that blueberries have a shallow and fibrous root, so that gives them a little bit more room to expand.
• 29:56
  SPEAKER_01: And uh and the roots grow sideways as opposed to being contained and use force to go deep because they don't uh they don't necessarily do that.
• 30:04
  SPEAKER_01: The uh the narrower the container or the smaller the container, the roots are gonna grow in circles and then they're gonna get root bound and you're not gonna get the water penetration and uh and they are gonna collapse eventually.
• 30:14
  SPEAKER_01: As a matter of fact, one of the things that we recommend uh people when they buy them is if you get a blueberry plant out of the nursery, oftentimes we don't know how long that plant has been in that one gallon container.
• 30:25
  SPEAKER_01: So what we tell people is to pull the plant out of the gallon and then rip the root system apart.
• 30:32
  SPEAKER_01: Rip it.
• 30:32
  SPEAKER_01: And sometimes you can rip chunks out of it and uh and then break it up so that when you put it in a bigger container, you repot it or transplant it to the soil, you have that root system spread out, and and then the roots will have will grow in different directions and not follow the same pattern that that they've been used to in that one pot.
• 30:51
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 30:52
  SPEAKER_02: I mean I've seen I've got tomato plants and I'm thinking, oh, I didn't twist them enough to put them in and they're not prospering.
• 31:00
  SPEAKER_01: And early on, that was one of the single the biggest reason why plants, blueberry plants, would collapse uh soon after transplant because they would choke, they wouldn't absorb any water, water wouldn't get into the root system.
• 31:11
  SPEAKER_02: So you just see stunted growth at that point, you don't see any vigorous activity that would cause that is correct.
• 31:16
  SPEAKER_01: And blueberries is in our experience are a very interesting plant because they don't necessarily wilt.
• 31:22
  SPEAKER_01: If you have a tomato plant that is uh lacking water, you will see that it starts drooping and it will tell you, hey, I'm thirsty, give me some water.
• 31:31
  SPEAKER_01: But blueberries in general, they will the the because of the woody nature of the plant, they won't wilt.
• 31:38
  SPEAKER_01: I mean you will see the leaves drying up and you will see them uh just falling off, but they will they won't tell you that they need water until it is perhaps a little late that you start noticing.
• 31:49
  SPEAKER_02: Because it's like uh an evergreen plant?
• 31:52
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I couldn't explain why.
• 31:54
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's just the uh the um composition of the leaves, I think, are are harder and more uh cellular, you know, stronger leaves and stronger canes than a tomato plant is.
• 32:05
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 32:06
  SPEAKER_01: So it's like I said, it's woodier.
• 32:08
  SPEAKER_01: You know, the whole structure of the plants is woodier and you don't see them wilting like you will see any other you know vegetable plants.
• 32:15
  SPEAKER_02: How about how about pest?
• 32:17
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, what kind of pest do you have to be concerned with uh in um and then let's talk about pests first.
• 32:25
  SPEAKER_01: On the pest side, blueberries have been uh a great crop to work with.
• 32:30
  SPEAKER_01: One of the reasons is I don't necessarily I'm not necessarily inclined to to to deal with pesticides myself.
• 32:37
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 32:38
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and so uh I've been lucky enough that the crops that I've uh researched don't necessarily require uh mainly because they are new to the state, don't re they don't require or or there aren't a lot of chemical products available to treat them.
• 32:53
  SPEAKER_01: But for the most part, blueberries has been have been very clean.
• 32:56
  SPEAKER_01: It's been a very clean crop.
• 32:58
  SPEAKER_01: The biggest problem we've had is uh um white flies.
• 33:02
  SPEAKER_01: You know, usually we've had a few, but but it's been variety dependent.
• 33:06
  SPEAKER_01: We've had white flies infest uh some varieties really badly, and uh all we did at the time really was spray them with high pressure water and knock the white flies off the plants, clean them up, and that was fine.
• 33:18
  SPEAKER_01: Um lately there's been a fruit fly that affects blueberries in in in Southern California in commercial settings.
• 33:26
  SPEAKER_01: We've been lucky enough not to have them in our field trials, and part of the reason is as a matter of fact, that this morning we were having a conversation uh with uh with one of my colleagues, and we f like to think that it is because we harvest blueberries so early in the season that the degree days have not been uh have not accumulated enough for the uh fly to infection, yeah, for the fruit flight to develop an effective fruit.
• 33:49
  SPEAKER_01: But there but it is uh that is pretty much the only problem uh with blueberries, because there is a there is a fruit fly that will uh lay eggs on the fruit and as it develops, and then you will find a tiny little maggot at times, but we haven't really had that problem in the here in the state.
• 34:04
  SPEAKER_01: It is a problem with other soft fruits like blackberries and uh raspberries, but uh we haven't had to deal with that.
• 34:10
  SPEAKER_02: Is there potential for people to I mean it sounds like right now these plants are pretty immune to any diseases that we currently have here in Southern California, but what about people bringing plants in from out of state?
• 34:25
  SPEAKER_02: Another blueberry plant.
• 34:26
  SPEAKER_02: Is there is there some type of disease or pest that would talk about disease?
• 34:31
  SPEAKER_01: Before we answer that, I I'll I'll make a comment that that is very encouraging.
• 34:35
  SPEAKER_01: In our or in uh all of our blueberry plantings, we've never lost a plant to golfers, which gopher seems to be a major problem in in Southern California, but golfers don't like them, and that is a big plus.
• 34:48
  SPEAKER_01: You don't have to grow them in in golfer baskets.
• 34:51
  SPEAKER_01: We haven't really lost a plant to golfers.
• 34:54
  SPEAKER_01: Uh now back to your question on the source of plants.
• 35:02
  SPEAKER_01: Um if there is a plant that golfers like beyond your blueberry fence, if you will, they they they'll find it.
• 35:11
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 35:12
  SPEAKER_01: But but the reason with we assume the reason they don't like blueberries is because the root system is so fibrous that there isn't like a tap root that they can go for.
• 35:20
  SPEAKER_01: And so they have to work really hard at eating, you know, fine roots before they're gonna go say get a meal, so they'll they'll go somewhere else.
• 35:27
  SPEAKER_01: Because uh we've seen gopher mounts in our blueberry uh plantings, but we've never lost one plant uh to to to gopher.
• 35:35
  SPEAKER_01: As far as sources for plants, uh I would say that uh for the most part, most of the blueberry plants we grow in California are imported from other states.
• 35:45
  SPEAKER_01: And uh no, there are no uh endemic diseases that come with them.
• 35:50
  SPEAKER_01: I mean uh the the soil environ soil has been a tricky part to bring into the state, but uh but usually these are grown in in putting media that's been sterilized and it's commercial type, it's not native soils to say that they will bring nematodes or other disease pathogens like that.
• 36:06
  SPEAKER_01: So they that's never been an issue.
• 36:08
  SPEAKER_01: I mean our plants that we uh have here at the station were uh came in from uh from a nursery in Oregon.
• 36:15
  SPEAKER_01: Uh in the past we've bought plants from nurseries in Michigan and uh and also North Carolina, which were the only pretty much nurseries that had plants available for us to grow.
• 36:24
  SPEAKER_02: But I I would imagine they're pretty vigilant about making sure because that could destroy their business.
• 36:29
  SPEAKER_02: The I guess the concern I would have or think about, and it I think it sounds like we're pretty well immune to this, short of someone who's visiting their family back in Michigan or Maine and they see a plant they want to bring back in.
• 36:45
  SPEAKER_02: We have this with other types of plants.
• 36:48
  SPEAKER_01: Uh with with blueberries uh again, the risk is minimal, but that is a very important point uh as as you travel the world.
• 36:58
  SPEAKER_01: Uh the main reason is that uh as you probably have seen the news or heard the news, Southern California, we uh we deal with plant quarantines just uh or pest quarantines almost on a yearly basis.
• 37:11
  SPEAKER_01: And uh and it uh there is a direct relationship with the multicultural nature of our cities.
• 37:18
  SPEAKER_01: I mean if you look at the LA basin, it is people from very much all over the world.
• 37:23
  SPEAKER_01: Same thing with San Diego County and Orange County.
• 37:27
  SPEAKER_01: So part of the challenge is that and and and usually all of these exotic or or new pest outbreaks we see happening more in urban areas than they happen in agricultural areas.
• 37:39
  SPEAKER_01: And part of the reason we suspect is that it is uh resid residents or or people from different countries who travel get nostalgic about missing a fruit from their native land, and then they bring either pieces of uh cuttings or seeds or or even fruit, you know, the actual fruit, usually uh smuggle it into the country and uh then they dispose of the seeds or peels or or what have you, and that's sort of how that's how some of these disease or pest outbreaks start.
• 38:12
  SPEAKER_01: So in terms of uh it's I like to tell people that uh not to do it.
• 38:20
  SPEAKER_01: I know it's hard because uh usually when when we travel to our native lands or native countries, there's always a relative who stays behind and always asks, you know, bring me this, bring me that, but we tell people not to do it unless it is on a cooked form, because uh it there is a risk for bringing past.
• 38:37
  SPEAKER_01: And California agriculture is too valuable for any of us to risk it.
• 38:42
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, we're talking about a twenty-six billion dollar industry statewide, who can be put at risk because somebody wants to eat uh guava or a mango or what have you from their native country.
• 38:54
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I I I think we should uh be more careful and uh and somewhat probably more responsible in that regard and think beyond our own our own selves in protect our agricultural industry because too many lives depend on it.
• 39:08
  SPEAKER_02: And I think people kind of it's like what's the big deal?
• 39:11
  SPEAKER_02: It's just uh even if you bring an orange in, that is creating a vulnerability for our system.
• 39:18
  SPEAKER_02: And we've actually had someone who brought in a uh citrus plant that was infected, and it's it's had a devastating effect on the citrus uh industry from an urban uh homeowner, basically.
• 39:38
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, the the social cost of dealing with these exotic pest outbreaks, I think, are enormous.
• 39:45
  SPEAKER_01: And probably if you ask me, there are better ways to spend government money than to deal in with an exotic pest and uh that we may never control and which may also put the agricultural industry at risk.
• 40:01
  SPEAKER_01: But back to your question, uh you made a comment about blueberry plants being immune to to pest and and diseases, and there is a saying out there that uh I saw on a on a on a truck or somewhere as I was driving the freeways of the state here, and there was a sign that says uh diamonds are forever, but disease resistance is not.
• 40:24
  SPEAKER_01: So we can never say that we are immune to anything because we never know.
• 40:28
  SPEAKER_01: The culture and the plant systems and different ecosystems are so dynamic that a plant may be free of disease or pests today, but uh that can change in a minute because of the reasons that we were just talking about.
• 40:40
  SPEAKER_01: You know, the the the influx of exotic pests and the fact that some of these plants are new to an area so pests don't know it's not it wasn't originally in their diet.
• 40:50
  SPEAKER_01: But if they find it, then they start liking it.
• 40:53
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 40:53
  SPEAKER_01: Uh with blueberries, the biggest pest problem we've had is birds.
• 40:57
  SPEAKER_01: They love them as much as we do.
• 40:59
  SPEAKER_02: And what do you do to counter that?
• 41:01
  SPEAKER_01: I I know the answer to this, but I just well, there are a lot of deterrents that people use.
• 41:06
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, uh we've seen from uh people flying, you know, hanging CDs, and I guess the reflective nature of the CDs deter birds.
• 41:14
  SPEAKER_01: There is uh some reflective tape that is being used.
• 41:19
  SPEAKER_01: And uh on the CDs, I guess you have to play with uh I don't know if it the the kind of music that the CD plays make a difference, but but but we we find that that they uh those techniques usually don't work.
• 41:30
  SPEAKER_01: Scared tactics don't necessarily work, they they get used to them and they will just go to them.
• 41:36
  SPEAKER_01: Um there are artificial noise makers that uh emulate the sound of predatory birds, you know, like hawks or or whatever, you know, what other birds are out there and then and then uh they are put out there in the field.
• 41:47
  SPEAKER_01: I've seen people use that.
• 41:49
  SPEAKER_01: For us, what's been most effective is uh is netting.
• 41:53
  SPEAKER_01: You know, you can get a piece of netting hung over the top of your blueberries and uh and you can create a structure fairly easy with that.
• 42:00
  SPEAKER_01: And I think we should.
• 42:00
  SPEAKER_01: Again, but it depends on on on uh your location as well, because what we're finding out if if there isn't if there aren't any uh taller trees for birds to perch on, then you know birds are not necessarily a problem.
• 42:12
  SPEAKER_01: And if you have plenty of blueberries, you know, I mean they will have some and and you can have some as well.
• 42:16
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 42:17
  SPEAKER_01: So it's it's it can be a problem, but it's not necessarily a a big issue.
• 42:22
  SPEAKER_02: Now I I I assume you remember you guys had an issue this past year with netting that got blown off and it got to be a little bit of a problem or challenge in trying to replace it.
• 42:34
  SPEAKER_02: Did you lose a lot because uh netting was missing or did it affect your uh yield at this same time?
• 42:40
  SPEAKER_01: And uh a combination of things, but yes, this year we were a research project was heavily impacted by by the fact that we did not have a netting.
• 42:48
  SPEAKER_01: But it had a lot to do with the rains as well, because uh our blueberry, this is an oichaser variety.
• 42:54
  SPEAKER_01: As I told you, we started peaking very early, uh kind of mid-January, and uh because of so much rain we had during the early part of the year, we couldn't get on the field.
• 43:04
  SPEAKER_01: And uh uh a windstorm in last fall had pretty much our netting is permanently over the top of our blueberry plantings.
• 43:12
  SPEAKER_01: So the wind ripped it and we just uh had to redo the whole structure and didn't have time to put it up on time before our harvest.
• 43:20
  SPEAKER_01: So yeah, we did lose our harvest uh or data har or harvest data on the snow chaser variety this season because of of that and because of bird damage.
• 43:32
  SPEAKER_01: I mean uh by the time we were ready to start the birds had already eaten most of them.
• 43:36
  SPEAKER_02: And so that's sort of a raccoons like these uh not in our experience.
• 43:43
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 43:44
  SPEAKER_01: No.
• 43:44
  SPEAKER_01: One of the th I mean we see other like what we see here is uh rodents, like I said, uh rabbits may uh or even coyotes if you're prone to in a coyote area, they will chew up your irrigation lines or what have you, but not necessarily fit on the plants.
• 44:00
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 44:00
  SPEAKER_01: We haven't seen any uh vertebrate pairs damage on blueberry plants yet.
• 44:08
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 44:10
  SPEAKER_02: Um so you know, you mentioned water watering, irrigation-wise.
• 44:14
  SPEAKER_02: Is any suggestions on how frequently you should be watering blueberry plants or um more as they're as they're blooming and fruiting and mind you, blueberries come from very wet areas, you know, areas with high precipitation.
• 44:29
  SPEAKER_01: So what we what we uh part of the uh the work we're doing right now is trying to fine-tune the irrigation requirements of blueberries for commercial production.
• 44:39
  SPEAKER_01: But because of the fibrous root system they have, I would say that blueberries benefit more from shorter, frequent irrigation intervals.
• 44:50
  SPEAKER_01: Water less more frequently, as opposed to water in larger amounts you know, less frequently.
• 44:57
  SPEAKER_01: So I would probably say if you can put two gallons every other day, a gallon per plant per mature plant, that would probably be enough, as opposed to putting ten gallons on Saturdays when you're home.
• 45:08
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 45:09
  SPEAKER_01: So I would say water spread, yeah, spread the re the water, the amount of water you you you apply them over two or three uh applications, and that would probably be better.
• 45:20
  SPEAKER_01: Just because of the shallower root system they have.
• 45:25
  SPEAKER_01: Your root system moist.
• 45:27
  SPEAKER_01: The other thing we encourage is to put a layer of mulch to to try to hold that moisture in as well.
• 45:32
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, you can put as much mulch as you can.
• 45:35
  SPEAKER_01: Uh the the the coarser the better.
• 45:37
  SPEAKER_01: That way, you know, as it decomposes, it's also as it humifies, you know, you get that acidification effect.
• 45:43
  SPEAKER_02: I'm always amazed at the temperature variation with having mulch at the base of a plant.
• 45:50
  SPEAKER_02: And and and maybe in some ways, does this encourage that kind of environment that they've come from in the in the past as far as most definitely.
• 45:58
  SPEAKER_01: I mean it it's it's a cooler, again, is the decaying organic matter, it uh it keeps the moisture in, so the root system are you know the feeder roots are for most plants are very weak.
• 46:09
  SPEAKER_01: So the looser, the the the the cooler, the less stressed they are, the the more the better they're gonna work in terms of taking up nutrients.
• 46:18
  SPEAKER_02: That's great.
• 46:19
  SPEAKER_02: That's great.
• 46:20
  SPEAKER_01: Um is there anything else that you can think of that we might tell folks about at home that would help them to make uh is an easier one of the things that we're seeing is because of what we discussed earlier about people not taking care of the pH of the soil prior to planting, one of the corrective measures that we we recommend is to to use iron chelates, you know, as a quick fix.
• 46:45
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and what we do is uh you you dissolve one gallon, one spoonful of of iron chelates and uh in a gallon of water, and then just drench your plants, I mean the root zone, and uh and that usually brings them back.
• 46:59
  SPEAKER_01: You start seeing if you know normally blueberry plants will start turning color in the fall because they are deciduous, you know, they they will start kind of getting a reddish tone to them into the leaf uh to the foliage.
• 47:13
  SPEAKER_01: But if you're seeing your plants getting that reddish tone in the spring, that is an indication that your soil pH is getting too high.
• 47:21
  SPEAKER_01: So reddish color on your on your foliage is fine in the fall, but if you're tursting in the spring and summer, that is telling you that it's time to do something about the soil pH.
• 47:33
  SPEAKER_01: And that's when we recommend to apply, you know, the soil, the the iron killase, dissolving water.
• 47:38
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, and is it it to me I always think that there's a sensitivity with the pH level on blueberries, uh the soil aspect of it.
• 47:47
  SPEAKER_02: Is there an easy way to measure that pH?
• 47:50
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, definitely.
• 47:51
  SPEAKER_01: You can you can uh there are some uh kits that allow you to get a quick idea of pH, even what you use for swimming pools, I think sometimes may even work.
• 48:01
  SPEAKER_01: But there are some uh disposable kits that you can buy and then get an idea of the pH.
• 48:07
  SPEAKER_01: You don't really have to get it down to the exact size decimal, but uh you know if uh blueberries like acidic soil, so the closer to four you are, the better off you are.
• 48:17
  SPEAKER_01: But if you see your pH creeping over six, that they will start telling you.
• 48:21
  SPEAKER_01: And so try to keep it between four and five, and then that should be that should be okay.
• 48:26
  SPEAKER_01: But you'll see that color variation for the most part of uh this and this is across varieties, they will start turning sort of a reddish color in the foliage.
• 48:34
  SPEAKER_01: And that's what would style I mean you don't want to get there.
• 48:37
  SPEAKER_01: Hopefully you will catch it before you will stay on top of it so that you never get to that point.
• 48:42
  SPEAKER_01: Because it does affect the the the intake of all nutrients, you know, and that's just a chance of this.
• 48:48
  SPEAKER_02: I think it's a fairly simple uh I mean if you want to get into that technical aspect of it, it isn't that difficult to do.
• 48:55
  SPEAKER_01: No, not at all.
• 48:56
  SPEAKER_02: And and it just gives you a handle to keep moving forward with these uh and and the other thing is amend your soil.
• 49:02
  SPEAKER_01: Like I said, you know, top dress your mulch on a yearly basis because it's you know it decomposes, it settles in, and if you stay on top of the mulch, chances are you may not need it to use any other corrective measures.
• 49:13
  SPEAKER_01: But uh but again it's and mulching really enhances your soil.
• 49:17
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, most definitely long term.
• 49:18
  SPEAKER_02: You know, it's one of those things that's like a spoonful of sugar, maybe.
• 49:22
  SPEAKER_01: And for a few uh you know, we were talking about pine bark mulch earlier.
• 49:25
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, it is available at garden stores, so if you can buy it, I mean uh depending on how many plants or how large an area you have, you know, you can buy a bag and just uh use it, or and and that'll definitely help even more with the uh acidification of your soil.
• 49:41
  SPEAKER_02: That's great.
• 49:42
  SPEAKER_02: That's great.
• 49:44
  SPEAKER_02: Well, um we're getting close to the end of our hour here.
• 49:47
  SPEAKER_02: This week's topic has been bountiful blueberries.
• 49:50
  SPEAKER_02: Uh my guest has been Romero Lobo, and um he is a farm lab advisor or small farm advisor.
• 50:00
  SPEAKER_02: Do I have that right?
• 50:01
  SPEAKER_01: That is farm advisor.
• 50:02
  SPEAKER_02: Farm advisor.
• 50:03
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 50:03
  SPEAKER_02: And when you know, I just I'm sorry, we didn't touch on this earlier.
• 50:06
  SPEAKER_02: Just real quick, what farm ad small farm advisors, what what is there a certain size that you deal with with farmers or five feet and under.
• 50:15
  SPEAKER_01: No, I just feet and under.
• 50:19
  SPEAKER_02: That is uh You like them to look at the roots.
• 50:23
  SPEAKER_01: No, the uh the official title is uh we used to be small farm advisors mainly because we used to be affiliated with the UC University of California, a small farm program.
• 50:35
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 50:35
  SPEAKER_01: But that program uh was uh pretty much discontinued or dismantled a few years ago, so right now we are just farm advisors.
• 50:43
  SPEAKER_01: What you find within the uh and we have a presence uh as as UC farm advisors, we are part of the UC Division of Agriculture and Natural Resources, and we have a presence in just about every county in the state.
• 50:57
  SPEAKER_01: And what we do is we support the agricultural industry or or the um or home gardeners in the counties where we are located.
• 51:04
  SPEAKER_01: So we all attach uh, you know, we all come at this with different expertise and sort of uh evolve based on the needs of the county or the region that we are in.
• 51:15
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 51:16
  unknown: Right.
• 51:17
  SPEAKER_02: Well, great.
• 51:18
  SPEAKER_02: Um we kind of reached the end of our show here, but before we end, is there anything else you'd like to tell our listeners that you can think of?
• 51:25
  SPEAKER_01: No, just to keep growing fruits.
• 51:27
  SPEAKER_01: Um we are doing our best to develop information, whether it is to uh through our conventional commercial research approaches, we try to adapt that information to support them.
• 51:40
  SPEAKER_01: But the work that you guys do as master gardeners makes a big difference in terms of helping out uh backyard growers and uh and and and in my own research now I'm incorporating uh the the home gardener also as part of my clientele or trying to develop and research techniques that work with them.
• 51:56
  SPEAKER_01: That's why the crops that I work were now we're talking about blueberries, but as I other crop research, uh work that I'm doing involves dragon fruit or pitahaya.
• 52:09
  SPEAKER_01: And uh most recently we've taken on uh looking at coffee as a potential research crop.
• 52:15
  SPEAKER_01: So those crops land very well to being grown on a commercial scale and also are wonderful house plants or backyard plants.
• 52:22
  SPEAKER_01: So um as uh you know, for the future, that maybe those may be some other topics that we touch on.
• 52:29
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and uh I'd love to talk to you and try to to share some of the information we have on those crops to to our own home gardeners.
• 52:37
  SPEAKER_02: That's great.
• 52:37
  SPEAKER_02: This has been a pleasure having you here today.
• 52:40
  SPEAKER_01: It's been uh for me as well.
• 52:42
  SPEAKER_02: So we are at the close of our show in the garden.
• 52:45
  SPEAKER_02: I'd like to thank Romero Lobo for being here with us and discussing blueberries and the different uh to me it seems like it's a very easy ironclad plant that you can't really mess up with and has some great benefits.
• 53:01
  SPEAKER_01: I I would agree with that, and that's part of the reason I chose them, because they are hard to kill.
• 53:06
  SPEAKER_01: As as uh all the crops that I mentioned, they're really hard to kill, and that's part of the reason I'm doing research with them.
• 53:12
  SPEAKER_01: Because uh one of the things that I do, and uh uh you know, as as uh the line of work that we do, we don't talk to our plants, you know, we neglect them equally, so we don't discriminate in that regard.
• 53:25
  SPEAKER_01: And uh so growing plants that are that die very easily is not necessarily something that I want to do.
• 53:31
  SPEAKER_01: Uh blueberries uh have been a wonderful crop, like I mentioned, a great plant to have at home to grow your own berries, and uh and it's been a great crop to have on a commercial scale for for for the benefit of California agriculture as well.
• 53:45
  SPEAKER_02: Well, we're appreciative of your effort and your work in this field of research, as well as taking the time to tell folks about what they can do regarding growing blueberries.
• 53:56
  SPEAKER_02: So thank you for listening to KUCI eighty eight point nine.
• 54:00
  SPEAKER_02: This has been In the Garden and we appreciate you listening.