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BlueberriesVARIETY: NORTHERN HIGHBUSH: Hybrid varieties of the Northern Highbush are the most widely planted commercial blueberries, with large, sweet fruit on bushes that grow up to four metres tall. This varieties require cold winters with a high chill factor to thrive and therefore grows well in Chile, Argentina and Poland NORTHERN HIGHBUSH VARITIES: Duke, Bluecrop and Brigitta SOUTHERN HIGHBUSH: Though the wild Southern Highbush (Vaccinium darrowii) is sometimes grown commercially, most cultivars are hybrids between the wild variety and the Northern Highbush. Its fruits are similar, but plants are tolerant of warmer conditions and do not need such a hard chill factor so can be successfully grown in warmer climates such as Spain and in Florida. SOUTHERN HIGHBUSH VARIETIES: Misty, O’Neal, Snowchaser RABBITEYE: Native to the south-eastern USA, the Rabbiteye blueberry is smaller than the Highbush varieties, though its fruits are similar in size. There are numerous cultivars. HISTORY Blueberries of different kinds are found all over the world, but the culinary blueberries we eat today owe their origins to several North American species: the Northern Highbush (Vaccinium corymbosum), the Southern Highbush (Vaccinium darrowii), and the Southern Rabbiteye (Vaccinium virgatum syn. ashei). Wild blueberries provided an important food crop for the Native American tribes that the earliest European colonisers came across in the early 1600s, and it wasn’t long before the settlers began using blueberries themselves. What they weren’t able to do, though, was grow blueberries successfully in their gardens, though many people tried, and in the end people came to conclusion that blueberries were simply unsuitable for domestication. As a result, blueberries continued to be collected entirely from the wild as late as the early twentieth century – much like blackberries before them. Around this time, though, a doctor called Frederick Colville started looking at blueberries afresh, and his research was picked up on in 1911 by an enterprising young woman from Whitesbog, New Jersey. Elizabeth Coleman White’s father was already growing cranberries on a large commercial scale, but when Elizabeth came across Colville’s work she wondered if it could be applied to the wild Highbush blueberries that already grew between her father’s cranberry fields. She persuaded her father to invite Dr Colville to conduct further research on his land, and over the next few years she organised the collection of promising wild blueberry plants from the local forests, while Colvile concentrated on developing the largest and sweetest hybrids from them. They began selling the first cultivated Highbush blueberries in 1916; later the Northern Highbush became the state fruit of New Jersey. Today Chile, Argentina and Poland have both become important producers. Northern Highbush cultivars are the most widely planted variety, Southern Highbush and Rabbiteye types – which do better in warmer conditions – are also grown commercially in the southern Chile and the US. |
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