Avoid Common Mistakes Pruning a Blueberry Bush
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- Опубліковано 20 бер 2016
- The mystery and art of pruning a bush is revealed. One of the most common question I get asked is "How do I prune my blueberry bush?" When I first started farming all I could fine were a few pictures and brief descriptions which were not very helpful. Watch this video to see pruning in action and learn the key techniques to avoid common pruning mistakes.
I wish all youtube videos were this good, you should make more, I think the reason this video is good is:
1. No distracting loud worthless "music"
2. Short and to the point
3. Has actual informed content
These things seem obvious, yet most videos here not only don't have all 3, many don't even have one.
Thanks for adding something useful to the world.
Excellent video thanks for taking the time to make it. It is a joy to watch someone prune the way you do. Hard pruning of old wood will reward both you and the bush as blueberries grow best on younger wood typically less than 6-7 years old.
The Felco 800's are are great tool but at approx $2800 they are truly for those who have the work for it. Hope you have time to make more videos there is an almost endless supply of subject matter on blueberries. I'm am just a homeowner with 50 bushes in my yard. I have made every mistake one can make growing them. I'm finally on the right path.
I subscribed and hope as you make more videos people will subscribe too.
Thank You !
Thanks for sharing this information. I think there are other less expensive electric pruners but I am not sure how durable they are. They might be a good choice for a situation like yours. I plan to post more videos in the spring and cover other topics as well.
@@ivanmishchenko3558 Dear Ivan, I have blueberry bushes that are close to 8 feet tall and some of them are thicker then my thumb. They are dense as well something of 20 stalks in each bush area. Should i just lop the oldest ones down and get everything to about 4 feet high? Iam scared and injuring them because of how old they are.
@@chrisraines9064 Hi Chris, You might consider just starting with one bush as a test for how hard to prune. There has been some Duke that we had that needed very heavy pruning that we pruned almost all of the canes withouth issue but for your peace of mind, consider starting with one and see what happens in the coming year. It is important to prune heavily enough to stimulate new canes to be grown. I would not be as concerned about the height but rather how old the canes are. As a rough rule of thumb, 25-33% of the canes are being pruned each year.
Hey, what if you have those new growths (reddish) coming out from those brown brunches (older ones), do you still cut them too?
This was a very good presentation. You were reluctant to show much in the way of close ups so didn't get to see the colors that you spoke of. Thanks for all.
thanks for the great info I'm wanting to get some nice blueberry bushes and it's great to learn this stuff :)
Thanks so much for this information! Currently I'm learning how to work on my family's blueberry farm and this is really helpful education.
Hi thx so much for your great video on pruning . Is there any chance in seeing how you trellis your bushes and maybe have a supply company in mind ? Thx
Wish you had more videos showing more of the operation look like you had some knitting going on over your bushes also love to see more info
Very helpful ... thank you
Very good informative
Awesome video. Thanks
Great job, Ivan! Thanks so much! See about getting Elmer some glasses for eye protection ; )
Awesome video gent's learned lots
Great Video
Excellent
I have bushes. Old bushes that are 8’ tall. These were here when I purchased the home. Would it hurt if cutting them down shorter and thin them in the fall
2023 and this video is still relevant. Thank you for this informative video. 👏🏾 🫐 👏🏾🫐
Hello! I love how you treat your plants as your children! Do you ever summer prune after harvest? It was recommended to do that by a commercial grower in CA. I’m sure it was a southern high bush. Thank you.
Hi We are harvesting at that time so pruning is not possible
Great video Ivan. I'm going out today to prune my 7 bushes (Virginia) and this video is very helpful. I do have 2 questions if you don't mind. (1) How does a farm deal with loss of berries from birds? I found that I have to cover my whole blueberry patch with nets, otherwise the birds will get every single berry. (2) Do you add anything to the soil for acidity? Every year I spread Garden Sulfur around the root zone of each of my bushes. Just curious if you do anything on the farm like that.
You are doing the best thing for keeping the birds off with the netting. Some farms may use netting but its complex and labour intensive. If possible test the soil for PH to determine what to add to get to optimal ph level in the soil.
Thanks for sharing! My bushes are 30 plus years old. But not pruned in the last 10 years. What should I do. I’m picking berries off a 12’ ladder. Thanks
Clint Walton What a great question and I don’t have an immediate answer. Do you know how many pounds your a getting off each Bush and what is the quality of the berries (size taste colour)? In this situation I would be likely heavily prune one bush to see what happens and determine a process for pruning the remaining
Could you have propagated those branches than bore fruit?
Then sell them since you know that branch bears fruit?
Ivan, helpful information. Difficult to distinguish the color difference on screen.
When a blueberry bush sends runners up in the ground, about 12-15 inches away from the main plant, what causes this?
And can those shoots be dug up and replanted?
Absolutely you can. When digging, make sure you get as much root connected to the runner as possible. It’ll look weird when dug up, like an “L” shape. But that’s what it’s supposed to look like. Now, in the middle of winter is the best time to do it too, so you’re in luck. The plants are sleeping so won’t experience any stress.
Just dig the runner up and put it where you want a new bush. Make sure you mound up the soil so when the spring rains come, it doesn’t drown in its new home. The soil in the newly dug hole won’t have compacted yet, so will hold more water than the soil around it, creating like a little pool. Mounding it up solves that. Good luck!
Oh yes, and if you can, mulch the mound so the spring rains don’t wash the soil away.
@@Garden-Oasis Thank you. Why does the plant do this, rather than send up new growth at the parent plant location?
@@dc-wp8oc blueberry plant branches naturally have a limited fruiting life (about5-6 years). In the wild, without human help to keep cutting away old growth and promoting new branches, it gets congested with unproductive branches that eventually die back. This would mean eventual death for a plant or at the very least a bunch of dead branches in the center shading out a ring of live growth on perimeter. Hence the evolution of runners. This way a mature bush can move to a new, less contested spot to restart the process of bearing fruit that birds could eat and then poop out the seeds at a far away location, so it can spread its genetics. Nature is beautifully poetic that way. When the plant encounters a challenge, it evolves to solve it.
I took some cuttings from Rabbiteyes and they successfully took but after a year in a pot I have one central 'trunk' as it were with quite a few canes branching up from the one central point. There are no other canes coming up from the crown. Should I remove all but three or so of the current canes and cut those back by half? Will this force the bush to push new canes from the roots under the soil and thus widen the crown? The plants are still in felt pots approx 12" round by 12" deep. I’m going to put them in 21 Gal pots this winter. The new pots are 22 in dia by 17 in deep
Hi Allan I am not sure what to specifically do in your case but I will tell you how we transplant bluberries. The cuttings in the nursery are put into one gallon pots. I am not sure if they are in the pot for 1 or 2 years before sale. When we transplant them into the ground, the goal is to maximize root growth. The plants come from the nursery with only one cane and many branches off the cane. The plant will be up to 2 feet tall. We prune the plant until there is only one cane about 8-12 inches in length and very litte branches. There should be at least a few buds on the cane that will growth a branch. This way there is little stress on the plant when it is transplanted to support a large canopy of leaves and branches.
@@ivanmishchenko3558 Thanks Ivan that makes perfect sense. I’ll try this approach and see how they do.
This is exactly my question & I can’t find videos to address what happens when you have older bushes (mine are about 15 yrs) with only one to three major canes. They branch up about 3-4 feet to an umbrella of fruit and leaves but no new canes ever appear from the soil. If I cut the main trunk-I’ve got nothing left and yet the canes severely cross over each other and rub due to wind in their early growing years. They are twisted & the only new growth is always at the top, rather minimal in output, yet the berries are decent. I’d like them to grow larger & more productive but fear killing the plants (about 8 of them is all) if I take the whole plant down by 2/3 or half for instance. It would just look like woody trunk with lichen and moss.
Hi,
Is that black material agrotextile?Can you please explain me how did you tighten it?
I have blueberry field in Serbia and I like your solution because of the weeds.
Thank you in advance for your response
Hi The black material is a greenhouse commercial grade landscape cloth. I am going to do a video for this technique as we use landscape cloth staples to hold down the cloth. The staples we can easily remove each spring to peel back the landscape cloth when we fertilize the plants and then we just use the staples to put the cloth back down. I also added wood shavings along the top to also help prevent weeds and help keep moisture in during the hot summer months. Just google landscape cloth staples and check out some images. Most farm stores will carry them.
Ivan Mishchenko
I would really appreciate if you could make a video where I can see all the details how you do it and on which distance you put staples.
Is that plastic material or some kind of wool? There are a lot of different materials on the market so I don't wanna make a bad choice.
Will definitely do it - not sure when thought
i Just purchased a 3 year old blue berry Bush. I just planted it today. should.i prune it? it has a few leafs on it and some dried fruit as well
When we plant a blue berry bush the focus in the first year is developing the root system only. We start by pruning the bush down to 1 - 2 canes that come out of the pot by about 12 inches. Make sure there are a few leaf buds on the canes. When the plant is pulled out of the pot make sure to split the bottom half open to make sure roots are loose and spread out. After planting into the hole, we walk around the plant to make sure the ground is well packed. Water lots and again, the focus in year one is just to support the root growth. The canes will grow abit year one and more the next year.
I just moved purchased my grandma’s house and she has 2 blueberry bushes that are approximately 63-68 yrs old. They have blueberries all over them right now but all the canes look old. What percentage should I remove since they probably haven’t been pruned for a long time?
Hi Lindsay, great and interesting question. One difficulty in answering this question is I am not certain what variety these berries are given how old they . Are they high bush berries? Its interesting that they have berries - what is the quality and size like? Are there any new canes growing from the crown this year?
when do you prune the blueberry for the first time? is it true you prune the very first flowers of the plant, so that the first year won't give any fruit? I live in UK...the process might be different, but an opinion would be much appreciated. Thank you
If you prune correctly to plant its very unlikely that there is anything left that will flower. If some does I wouldn't be concerned about it - it will only be a few berries. Some advice that I have read is to remove the berries on the second year to accelerate the growth of the bush. This is just my opinion but I noticed that bushes can produce heavy one year and then less the second when there is a lot of new growth. My goal is to have consistent yield year to year so I do not remove flowers in the second year. This creates balance from year to year in yield and new growth.
Hi I have 12 foot blueberry bushes planted in the early 70’s and most of them have bark all the way to the top. They produce an incredible amount of berries.
What is the best time of the year to prune them and will they take a couple of years before they start producing berries again??
These are in the yard of my wife’s parents house that we purchased.
I’m afraid I may kill them and I would rather not. We were infested with some kind of vine everywhere in the yard and in my 75’ section of those bushes. I have another 40’ that are smaller and I was thinking of leaving those alone until the pruned bushes produce fruit again. Any suggestions? Are they at the end of their life cycle? Any suggestions I would be grateful!!
Thanks
Dave
Hi Dave - Newer commercial varieties of blueberries have been developed in recent decades. I am not familiar with older varieties. - Amazing to have bushes that are 12 feet tall. Do you know how much each bush is producing and how far apart are they planted from each other? What state or province do you live in ?
I personally think that pruning is best left in the January/February timeframe for my climate. Some farmers start in November but I would ask the question - why would someone expose the cane after cutting to an entire wet winter exposed to bacteria and fungus that can infect the bush? As such I try to prune as last as possible in the winter.
If you are concerned about damaging or kill the plants, why not prune a few bushes in the first year and see what the results are? You could try different levels of pruning and measure the results over the next few years before pruning the other bushes.
I am not certain the length of a life of a blueberry bush but heard they can last 50 years (and likely more) as long as the roots are kept healthy.
Hi Ivan,
Thank you for replying. My blueberry bushes are almost 50 years old and are in an open field. This was my wife’s parents property and her dad would plant anything and get a ridiculous amount of produce.
I live in Massachusetts. As far as how much the bushes produce has never been quantified. This year I had so much and no time to pick them all so I let everyone in my family, people I hired to remodel would ask and I let them take what they wanted.
I can crawl between them fairly easily as long as the turkey that stays all year isn’t under with babies. Sounds nuts right. So basically they were planted and left to grow with no attention and they produced like crazy. My mother in law would put blueberries in just about everything to try and use them up. There was always last Years blueberries in there freezer while the present years turning blue. This was old dairy farm land and anything planted grows like crazy.
@@MrCaissed One approach to consider is just to prune one bush and see what theffects are over the next few seasons - is there new growth of canes stimulated by the pruning? Is the quality and yield on the new canes substantially greater than the unpruned parts?
what is that pruning tool Elmer is using? we are using manual pruners (loppers), that tool would help us tremendously.
Hello, It is a Felco 800 series battery powered pruner. An excellent investment when there is a lot of pruning to do. Zeller and Sons in Naramata BC would be the place to source and get service. Their service is awesome!
Ivan Mishchenko
K. Prany طمواعيد نقل اشجار التين لمكانها الداءم
K. Prany طمواعيد نقل اشجار التين لمكانها الداءم
K. Prany طمواعيد نقل اشجار التين لمكانها الداءم
is this kind of pruning can be done to aronia berry ???
Hi, I am not familiar with the aronia berry.
When is the best time to do the pruning? Thanks. Best wishes Bob.
November to February. I prefer January to February as it minimizes the time over the winter that the pruned parts of the bush are exposed to the elements. Ideally it is done as late in the winter as possible before the buds start to swell.
Thank you.
what do you fertilize the bushs with?
Hi Rocco We have a very complex nutritional program - too much to share here but I may do a video in the future with some suggestions. The fertilization program also changes each year based on tissue and soil analysis and new types of fertilizers becoming available for organic farming.
organically go with seaweed(kelp) and blood meal(nitrogen/iron) nice vigor and health and micronutrients.... spinkle 1 tbsp of each around a younger plant and 2-3 around each more mature bush and water in.... you will thank me later! :P
The kelp surprises me I use 15-9-12 and holly tone
블루베리 가지치기는 어디에서나 동일한 것 같습니다.
give a bit more info on the black slick-looking plastic. has it a name?
This is agricultural fabric or cloth. The one used on the farm is often used in greenhouses as well. Its very durable and long lasting. It is a woven variety.
what do,you fertalize with?
I will do another video in the future around fertlizing
What about the pruning of biloxe
Where is the how to fertilize vid you were talking about? I just bought a half dozen bluecrop berries in 20 gallon pots they are 10 years old and 6 ft tall
How about right now? - the video should be posted shortly. Thanks for the reminder
Hi, is there a way to contact you? EMail or something? I want to make 20-40 hectares of blueberry and the way your garden looks is the way i want mine :)
I want a clipper like Elmer's.
We bought the house we are in two years ago and the property has a blueberry bush..or maybe I should say a blueberry TREE! This plant is bearing blueberries right now. Problems is, the tree is almost 7 feet tall! I know it has not seen a pruning in its entire life. This plant is maybe 5 to 6 years old. When should it be pruned?
Barbara, he wrote up above that they prune January to February! My neighbor has 5 that need pruning, and that is why I'm watching this video!
Ohh ok thx
Is this true for young blueberry bushes that are in a container?
I am not sure I understand the questions. Do you mean the pruning instructions in this video or something more specific?
@@ivanmishchenko3558 Are young plants pruned the same way and as often? What if they are in a container, does that change anything?
@@frankt7521 When we plant a blueberry bush, we prune it down generally to one or two stalks 8-12 inches high. After that, there is not pruning for a few years. I don't experience with blueberries in containers but would guess they need to be pruned in a similar fashion. In a container, the growth might not be as vigorous so the prune might not be done as much. Just watch the canes and you can learn which ones need to be pruned as they age and change.
can i buy the tree and send it to indonesia
Is chicken manure ok for blueberry plants? How about pine boughs as mulch?
Hi Dotty. Great questions. Ideally a soil and leaf analysis test is needed to determine what types of nutrients are required and also determine the soil PH. The manure would also need to be analysed to determine what nutrients it has. Generally for the home gardener these tests are expensive and not generally down. Pine needles can be worked in the soil to make it more acidic if the PH is too high. I am not sure I would use pine boughs as mulch as there is little control over how much the PH is being altered. Sawings from pine wood could be used as mulch. With the chicken manure, it would be important to ensure it is well composted to ensure the roots dont get damaged from raw manure with high nitrogen content.
thanks for getting back, I'll do another test I bought at Lowes.
Buddy re upload with audio turned up please!
Лайк!!! 👍
Nice, but it really didn't discuss how to avoid common mistakes pruning blueberry bushes
Sound?!
Keep red can and get rid of brown cane
No Sound!!!
Bruce banner is pruning blueberries :)
I don't have to prune my Blue Berry bushes, a heard of Deer do it for my. What am I saying, ... the Blue berry bushes I used to have.
well thanks elmer, I can't really hear the other man
So cut brown canes
Давай по русски! 7лет прошло! Ты там как?
Audio.
Need closeup video.
Not a good demo
Your a dumb shit then, Elmer showed what to do. cut the old brown nasty wood and unleash fresh growth.