Why was it so hard to Farm the Blueberry? : History of blueberry Farming in the USA
“When I see as now in climbing one of our hills, huckleberry and blueberry bushes bent to the ground with fruit, I think of them as fruits fit to grow on the most Olympian or heaven pointing hills. It does not occur to you at first that where such thoughts are suggested is Mount Olympus, and that you who taste these berries are a God. Why in his only royal moment should man abdicate his throne?”
- Henry David Thoreau
If I could nominate one fruit to be the national fruit of the United States, it would be — the blueberry. Sorry, Apple…Americans, we fiercely guard our independence, we cherish our freedom; we’re even known to be a bit wild…Let’s go with that. Because that, my friends, is also the spirit of the blueberry.
Even though it’s native to North America. even though it’s been growing here for thousands of years — it remained totally untamed until very recently.
You know, my grandmother never even saw a blueberry as a young woman, and she ran a fruit stand in Brooklyn! It wasn’t until the early 1940s that farmed blueberries really took off nationwide. Before that, if you wanted blueberries, you had to find and pick them in the wild.
Blueberries — How Does It Grow?
Our investigation starts in the storied Pine Barrens of New Jersey, whose official state fruit is the blueberry!
This is Whitesbog Village, the birthplace of the global blueberry business. Today, it’s a National Historic Site, and home to a big annual blueberry festival. A century ago, it was the first place anywhere to commercially farm the High-bush Blueberry.
Role Blueberry played in the lives of Native Americans
To fully appreciate the blueberries’ place in American culture, we have to go back to the huge role they played in the lives of our native people.
- For them, the blueberry was food; it was medicine; it was a spiritual symbol.
- In fact, they called them “star berries”, for their perfect five-pointed star at the blossom end.
- They were a gift from the Great Spirit. From roots to leaves, Indigenous people use every part of the blueberry bush.
- They brewed a tea for women in childbirth, they boiled the blueberries down into thick cough syrup.
- They also dried them — so they could be eaten in the long lean winter months.
The waves of European immigrants who came to this country embraced this new fruit, but none of them as deeply as the Native American peoples.
Tips: Beeswater blueberry organic honey water is the perfect blend of blueberry and honey that is not too sweet but will leave your taste buds asking for more
An Incident that changed the History
It wasn’t until 1911, that blueberries got serious attention again, this time from the daughter of a cranberry farmer. She lived right here at Whitesbog — then New Jersey’s largest cranberry farm. Elizabeth Coleman White is a heroine in the male-dominated stories of American agriculture. She had the vision to expand her father’s cranberry operation to include blueberries in the summer.
And so she invited Frederick Coville, a botanist who had just made a groundbreaking blueberry discovery. Previously, people had dug up wild blueberry bushes and replanted them in their best soil. They nurtured them like they would do any other fruit crop, only to watch them die.
Coville figured out a strange but fundamental secret: blueberries demand highly acidic soil — soil that can’t support most other crops. And Jersey’s barren pinelands were perfect for blueberries. They grew wild everywhere. But farming is all about growing a consistent crop, so White and Coville set out to find the best of the wild blueberries that they could then cultivate and eventually crossbreed.
I should probably note here that there’s not just one kind of blueberry, just like there are many kinds of apples — there are blueberries with different colors, sizes, tastes, and textures.
White enlisted locals to search the woods for large berries. She named each plant they chose to cultivate after the person found it.
Now to grow a whole field of Rubels, White and Coville used the same cloning technique that’s used today. For that, we’re heading to Atlantic Blueberry Company. Once the world’s largest blueberry farm, it’s still the largest in New Jersey. The US — by the way — is the worldwide leader in cultivated blueberries. While Canada is tops for wild ones.
What’s the difference?
Wild berries grow on low bushes found wild, then fertilized and cared for, like farmed ones. But we’re following the story of the cultivated High Bush, which provides the lion’s share of the world’s fresh blueberries. The life of a blueberry bush begins in the nursery. Small cuttings from a chosen variety are planted and nurtured until they’re strong enough to be transferred to the field.
A modest harvest can take five years, but a bush bears fruit for up to 50. Blueberries are born in the spring after the bushes bloom with bell-shaped flowers. You can see that star shape at the tips of their petals. When the berries emerge, they’re the lightest of green. Then they deepen into reddish pink, and finally into their famous dusty blue. To extend the season, most farms grow at least
Three different blueberries — ones that ripen early, midseason, and late
So if you think your blueberries taste different throughout the summer, you’re right! They are not all the same variety. But there’s an even deeper secret here: the best blueberries, ones with flavor that would knock your socks off, are not sold in stores. The big farms don’t grow them — they’re too risky. The berries are too delicate, or the bushes too sensitive. But you might find these tasty ones at Farmers’ Markets. They’re also available in seed catalogs — so you can grow your own. That means you can pop these little powerhouses of Vitamin C and A, plus antioxidants whenever you like.
The Harvesters
When it’s time to harvest blueberries don’t make it easy. They don’t all ripen at the same time on the bush, so pickers need to harvest with as much care as they do speed, taking only the ripest of berries.
The harvesters have to have the lightest of hands. This sort of the frosted color of the blueberry is a protective coating — it’s called the “bloom”. And if you touch them too much, they turn really dark like that, which means that the coating is off, and it means that the shelf-life of these berries is cut by…two or three days.
I really don’t call them “pickers”, I call them professional harvesters. There’s this idea that anybody can come out here and they’re going to come up with a… great quality berry…It’s not gonna happen!
At Atlantic, berries sold fresh are harvested by hand, but usually, after two pickings, machines do a final sweep, shaking the bushes to release the remaining berries. Since they may suffer a few knocks, they go straight to the freezer to be sold as frozen berries.
Meanwhile, hand-picked berries hit the sorting line. A color scanner weeds out under-ripe berries — anything that isn’t blue. These may go into juice, purees, and even pet food. The berries then drop onto a pressure plate. Softer, over-ripe berries move slower than firm ones, so they are rejected from the line and often wind up frozen.
Thanks to the pioneering work done right here in New Jersey a century ago, blueberries are now farmed all over the world, from New Zealand to the Netherlands. And the antioxidant craze has helped global production triple in the last decade alone. It’s a huge accomplishment for a wild little American berry — or maybe it was destiny…After all, the Native Americans believe the blueberry was a divine gift.
Bee’s Water is a honey-infused hydration beverage. Our unique and proprietary blend of honey water is infused with a mix of 100% organic honey for sustained energy, herbal extracts, and a 200% daily requirement of vitamin C, a powerful antioxidant to help support your immune system. All these benefits are wrapped in a variety of refreshing flavors to make for tasty hydration.
Bee’s Water does not contain any artificial sweeteners, no added refined white sugar, and no high fructose corn syrup.
In case you are wondering, Bee’s Water is USDA certified organic, gluten-free, non-GMO, Kosher, and caffeine-free.
Depending on the flavor, you may get additional benefits from turmeric, elderberry, clove, and cinnamon extracts. All herbal extracts are known to be good for you.
Bee’s Water can be enjoyed hot or cold. Drink it cold for hydration and a refreshing thirst-quenching experience. Enjoy it hot like a tea when you warm up in a glass for a soothing and calming feeling of pure natural honey.
