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Berry farms
Any one have any experience/ideas/tips/links on berry farming.
I am thinking about starting one.
Thanks
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Berry farms
Me too -- would appreciate tips.
Blueberries and rasberries.
jim
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Berry farms
The Ontario Ministry of Agriculture used to publish some very good booklets on cultivation of berries. I don't think I could find mine anymore. The booklets used to be free, but I imagine there's a charge nowadays. Here's a link to their current publications:
http://www.gov.on.ca/OMAFRA/english/products/hort.html
In the states, county agents may have similar information. However, I seem to recall that my uncles' comments about county agents were mixed at best.
Around here, we don't have to cultivate berries. Our bush and meadows are full of various kinds. Generally you can just go and pick one kind or another from late spring to early fall. There may be a new problem for berry growers here. We had a serious plague of Asian ladybugs last fall. I’ve heard this variety munches not only aphids but also people and berries. I know for a fact about munching people since I was on a ladder putting aluminum on the eaves of a new shed during the plague. I don’t know if they will become a crop pest. They definitely became people pests and apparently they have no predators or parasites here.
I grew up with the bug as good luck thing and never imagined I’d come to dislike them. I do dislike them though, and I probably don’t have many good words for the companies that sold them as fashion pieces to suburban want to be organic types.
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I have not grow blue berries or raspberries other than for my own consumption. We had Strawberries in KY and planted beds in the everbearing. We had berries until nearly Christmas. Unfortunately the buyers stopped looking for them, long before that time.
The worst problem we had with the berries was that they attract chiggers. As the number of berries perday was not too large we picked ourselves. After a while we found we could wash down with vinegar and water after picking to remove the chiggers.
A friend of mine has blue berries here in AL and we picked one year for a chigger infestation. Maybe it can be controlled with spraying etc, but it would certainly discourage U-pick.
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I don't know about there, but here you must plan on ways of keeping bigger critters out of the produce. My list of culprits includes wild horses, mule deer, jackrabbits, cottontails, skunks, ground squirrels (two varieties), field mice, too many kinds of fruit eating birds to count and coyotes. Yup, shot one last year, eating apples right off the tree. Rocks didn’t impress him much. Did prove to be lead deficient when he came around for desert. Think I’ll try potatoes this year.
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To keep the birds away you often have to net the blue berries. Sometimes you can get away with netting only one bush.
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In NH and Maryland you have to put the nets on down to the ground - ravens will go under the net and jump into the bushes. And they are smart enough to know the cats will not jump on the nets!!
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