The wild blueberry season is under way with roadside stands, signs and farmers’ markets proudly displaying pints and quarts of plump blueberries. Behind the scenes the blueberry farmers are hard at work over the short harvesting period of about three to four weeks. Also hard at work supporting the industry are scientific researchers at the University of Maine and elsewhere and professionals at the Wild Blueberry Commission of Maine.
The late frosts in May were of definite concern to the industry, hitting right after the first blossoms were set. “The season has been pretty interesting,” says Lily Calderwood, University of Maine Cooperative Extension wild blueberry specialist. “In May there were three different frost events, and those reduced the crop. The flowers were pollinated in the first week.” But the next two weeks saw hard frosts that had a variable effect on blueberry fields. She explains that after the late frosts there were blossoms that were subsequently pollinated, makingfor a fruit-bearing season that made it hard for growers to know when to harvest.
“Harvest is well under way now,” she adds, and the blueberry fields are loving the change in the weather to cool nights, warm days and a modicum of rain to keep things moist. “It’s perfect for the harvest.”
The berries that Mingo’s is processing were not affected by the late frost, says company owner Artie Mingo. He’s hearing from the wineries, brewery and distiller that he works with that they are looking forward to using the intensely flavored berries that are coming from the fields. The company offers fresh pack and frozen berries for retail sale at their facility near Red Beach, but the primary business is processing and freezing the berries for value added uses like wine, beer and more.
“Frost events are very spotty,” explains Eric Venturini, executive director of the Wild Blueberry Commission of Maine. Some fields will see more of an impact, depending on whether they are located in a dip or ona rise. Producers were worried, he notes, because in some places the severe frost came in at 26 degrees with flowers in full blossom. However, since then there has been consistent moisture, and the berries are sizing up nicely, he says.
The five year average of berry harvest in the state has been 75 million pounds, says David Yarborough, emeritus wild blueberry specialist at the University of Maine Cooperative Extension. This year he expects that the harvest will be around 60 to 65 million pounds.
Over at Cherryfield Foods, David Bell says of the blueberry plant’s ability to compensate for the late frosts, “It’s just an amazing plant. The plants will compensate the loss of fruit by growing bigger berries.” He adds that while it won’t be a bumper crop this year, “it’s still a very good crop of excellent quality.”
Supporting the wild blueberry with research
The long term health of the thousands of acres of wild blueberry barrens and fields and the industry that grows, farms and proesses the berries is supported by a number of organizations. Calderwood works with many others to determine what kinds of strategies could be used to help the wild blueberry to thrive in a changing climate. Research on softwood chips to use as mulch in the field is one, biochar another. Irrigation management is a third. Calderwood says, “Mulch alone won’t solve a severe drought.” Bell notes that at Cherryfield Foods about 95% of the fields are irrigated.
Another research area focuses on innovations in harvesting technology. Cherryfield Foods uses mechanical harvesters 100% of the time, but some growers will use a combination of people using hand rakes and mechanical harvesters. Very small growers will usually be 100% hand raked, which Calderwood explains makes sense for the fresh pack retail market, or in other words, those pints and quarts at roadside stands where each berry needs to be perfect. The rest of the berries are usually quick flash frozen for value added products, includig bags of frozen berries found in grocery freezers for year-round use in baked goods, syrups and other enticing foods enhanced by the wild blueberry taste and color.
Calderwood explains that a study taking place in the field is using videos for slow motion recording of mechanical harvesters picking the berries at ground level to see exactly how a berry is plucked and how much and what type of damage can occur. The videos will be analyzed with the goal of reducing “harvest shrink,” the loss of berries that fall to the ground.
The Cooperative Extension’s Blueberry Hill Farm in Jonesboro has received $3 million in federal funds to further areas of research and includes a state of the art fresh pack line machine that has a color sorter. The sorter can remove unripe white, green and red berries, greatly reducing the amount of labor for hand sorting the rest. Reducing the need for labor is important, she points out, because of the growing decline in and high cost of labor.
A very diffeent strategy to wild blueberry health has been undertaken by Ellen Johnson of Lamb Cove Farm in Robbinston. She uses organic growing practices for her berries, which she sells as fresh pack at farmers’ markets and directly to customers. Over the last few years she has planted a strip of 719 pollinator plants around her five acre field. The goal is to create a hedgerow that blooms mostly in July, “when the blueberry field and surrounding area has very few other flowers for the wild bees. Wild bees can’t survive unless they have a food source during the entire season.” She adds, “It’s my hope that these flowers will help the pollinator insects, many of which are dwindling, and they in turn will help me by pollinating the blueberry flowers.”
For this blueberry season, Johnson notes that her field is producing more berries than in recent years, “maybe due to the abundant rain.” She starts her harvest around August 1 and tries to harvest for up to four weeks if possible. She doesn’t use ay herbicides, pesticides, fungicides or fertilizers, so weeds and trees are her biggest challenge. “They’re difficult to control without herbicides.”
Marketing the wild blueberry
The trajectory of decline in small wild blueberry farms that was of real concern in 2017 has improved a bit, Calderwood notes. The Wild Blueberry Commission of Maine’s mission is to promote the wild blueberry to domestic and international markets, to support research and to represent the industry to policy makers. That work, undertaken since 1997 when the commission was created by a legislative act, has had results, Calderwood says. The third annual Wild Blueberry Weekend, when people can visit blueberry farms, see the growing, harvesting and processing for themselves and taste up a storm, “makes a difference.”
The last USDA census that measured the number of wild blueberry farms was in 2017, so the most current numbers are not yet available, but Venturini says that from that census there were 485 wild bluberry farms in Maine. “The value of the product has been increasing since 2017, so that’s very positive.” However, he adds that costs have gone up, and a major factor facing the industry is that many producers are nearing retirement.
There are 15 different wild blueberry farms participating in the Wild Blueberry Weekend this year, says Venturini. Thousands of people go to the farms and come away with a hands on experience that “will stick with them for the rest of their lives.” They’ll try their hand at raking, see how the berries are cleaned, talk to farmers, some of whom go back seven to eight generations.
The two biggest competitors to the Maine wild blueberry, explains Venturini, are the cultivated high bush blueberries grown globally and the wild blueberries grown in Canada. The Quebec industry is boom and bust, he says, and when they have a big crop “it can really throw off the market conditions.” Canada produces many more wild blueberries than Maine. The bigger issue, though is the cultivated berry. “Twenty to thirty years ago they were just a blip on the map.” Now projections expect five billion pounds of high bush berries to be cultivated by 2024. “Most of that is sold fresh” right now, he explains, but as the yield increases the cultivated berry industry will need to flash freeze and find other value added uses for their berries, which will compete directly with the wild blueberry value added market.
Venturini stresses that wild blueberries are far superior in taste and nutritional content to the cultivated berry. “The quality is superior,” he notes. Cherryfield Foods’ David Bell couldn’t agree more. “It’s a wonderful time to get them fresh, but year round you can get the frozen wild blueberry at the grocery store,” and it’s that segment of the market that drives the local wild blueberry’s economic health. He laughs when he says he doesn’t understand why anyone would buy a frozen bag of cultivated berries when they can get the wild frozen instead. Th key difference that he wants people to understand is that wild blueberries grow in hundreds if not thousands of different varieties that occur naturally in the field. Different color blossoms and plants result in different berry tastes that when harvested are combined into a complex and rich flavor. Cultivated high-bush berries were bred for two things, he says, for their big size and thick skins for easy transport.
Along with the iconic flavor, the commission notes that wild blueberries have twice the antioxidants of high bush blueberries, a big plus when it comes to the person at the other end of the blueberry table getting ready to eat them. It also helps when marketing the berry. Venturini says that the commission has just returned from a trade show in Singapore to develop a market for the berry. “We’ve done similar efforts in the past closer to home.” One of those efforts, especially in Maine, but also domestically, is to highlight the state in the name of the Maine wild bluebery. It’s an attribute that is an important part of the story, he explains. “People increasingly want to know where their food comes from.”
And in terms of the retirement of those involved with wild blueberry farms, Venturini and Calderwood note the importance of Maine Farmland Trust in promoting wild blueberry farms and lands to potential new farmers. Calderwood says, “We are still in need of more farmers to take on farms and fields that are being lost.” The commission works with the trust, as do Calderwood and others, to make sure that the backbone of the Maine wild blueberry industry remains healthy.
