RE: Bluberries in California

["Penny Livingston" <pinc@svn.net>]

We're growing blueberries just fine here on the coast north of San
Francisco. We're growing Blucrop, Bluray, Patriot and some others. We
usually have about a week of below freezing weather in the winter. The
blueberries are delicious!  I have addes mulch from misc. tree trimmings.
The only problem is I have to keep picking the flowers and fruit off for a
few years to get the bushes to grow larger. They will only grow or fruit,
but can't do both in a year.  I think that's why you don't see large
bluberry bushes in the wild very often. In our food forest sometimes a few
escape and we get to eat them.

Don't have a clue about how blueberries would do in Southern CA or a
subtropical situation.

Re: access to fruit. I think one could distinguish if we're foraging or
doing production for market. Are we growing food or money? Foraging is fun
and my experience shows that access happens through self organization over
time. We can also prune or move plants or "wade" through. Plants can adjust
themselves over time. Some plants choke out others over time as well. (It's
brutal out there!) I've also been exploring the mandala keyhole garden
pattern with the fruit tree in the center, keyhole pathways and understory
plantings in mandala garden pattern.

Production is a different story and one must really think about easy access
and massing plants together to save time and energy (ie money).

Penny



-----Original Message-----
From: rick valley [mailto:bamboogrove@cmug.com]
Sent: Thursday, July 20, 2000 5:27 PM
To: permaculture
Subject: Re:all theory thread (long)[longer still]

How do you maneuver a ladder in a food forest indeed!
I have to say that I treat the Manual illustrations as cartoons, not
blueprints! I do lots of "plant 'em all- let God sort 'em out" designs, as
any of my friends will testify- and I'm very familiar with mistakes &
pratfalls, but I've made lots of good observations studying abandoned
homesteads, old Italian's gardens, wild fruit groves of all sorts. It's
highly complex, a huge subject, and I think there's so much opportunity for
permies to specialize (!) in this sort of design.
Caging small fruit is def. a workable tactic; Mollison talks about it; so
how
do you plan the cage for multiple functions? What can you use under
blueberries? What can you do to supply an acidic mulch? What varieties you
can grow are highest in antioxidants? Do you want one harvest or an extended
one? On the other extreme, how can you grow a blueberry in Cal.,(miles from
its home), in a low-input manner, and not get it eaten by deer? (I think it
could be done)
Nothin' but fun...
-Rick


Rick Valley Northern Groves
PO Box 1236, Philomath, OR 97370
Mobile-(541)602-1315, hm.& msg. (541)929-7152  Bamboo catalog $3 or at
<http://www.teleport.com/~dbrooks/bamboo.html>
"Useful Bamboos and other plants‹ Permaculture education‹ Ecological design
&
consultation centering on water,landform and horticultural systems"



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