Ready for storage or shipment.
Sunnyside Farms Inc.
PO Box 216
North Vassalboro, ME 04962 US
shoustn@gmail.com
The fruit set occurs in late May early June. Water is now the key ingredient for a good crop.
Old weighing station.
Bumble bees are native to the Americas. They excellent pollinators. They vibrate their bodies in the flower which causes them to be covered with pollen which passes to the next flower. Very effective. They will work in the worst weather.
Wild Blueberry bushes need to be pruned every other year in order to maintain crop potential. Number 2 fuel oil was used to fuel burning machines starting around 1940. Burning was the traditional method used by most growers. Burning can be effective in controlling insects and disease, however it is also burns valuable compost on the topsoil and is more expensive. Straw or hay can also be used to help burn fields. Hay promotes unwanted weed growth. Increasing fuel costs and research initiated other pruning techniques such as flail mowing which prunes/cuts the blueberry bush very close to the ground.
Below are clones that show incomplete pollination or the clones inability to sustain all the fruit that may have been pollinated. If you zoom in on the pictures you will see the small undeveloped berry.
Bee hives may be damaged by bear (on purpose) or moose (accidentally). Sometimes loading or unloading may result in damage to hives which may cause the bees from the damaged hive to swarm. Above is a "bee ball" caused by a broken hive while in transport. The workers are surrounding the queen and will soon fly off to establish a colony in a suitable location.
Stainless steel holding vats are filled with the frozen wild blueberries in storage. The vats can supply the picking tables, the laser separator or to fill 10 and 30 pound wholesale boxes lined with plastic bags. The boxes of berries are stored and shipped at optimum freezing temperatures.
Picking lines may still be used in some plants.
New weighing station.
The new burn winters with a protective blanket of snow cover, hopefully. Blossoms appear in May and last for 3-4 weeks on the average. Bee pollination is a key component for an abundant crop. To ensure good pollination growers rent bee hives for their fields. 2 to 4 hives per acre is preferred.
Oil Burners
Pink with a blush of blue . These berries are large and juicy. This clone is the only one of its kind in our field. It has a average yield of 50 pounds every other year. We use it for baking pancakes, muffins, cakes, etc. They are not the best choice for pies, they have a higher water content. The bottom right picture shows two or more clones. Some berries are blue in color another is blackish in color and another appears to be in-between blue and black. The black blueberries can be sweet and large when ripe or small and tart. We will include a more in depth look at this in 2022.
Here are some pictures of the 2016 crop. It was harvested and processed using IQF (Individually Quick Frozen) techniques. The fruit was healthy and plentiful.
Disregard for posted land is common on blueberry fields.
Flail mowing
Cleaned and washed berries are conveyed to the IQF blast freezer.
Emil Rivers old style winnowing machine circa 1930.
Straw or Hay burn
These clones are a silver blue. The clone on the right has some fruit that will not ripen before harvest time. The berries have a firm consistency with a sweet dark purple/blue juice. Excellent for additions to anything and all types of baking.
The fields are clean of rocks and leveled. The blueberry bushes underwent stress during this process. The fields will yield a smaller crop for 2-3 cycles (4-6 years).
Colonized honey bees working the bloom. They go for the nector in the flower. The pollen sticks to their body which is passed on to the next blossom they visit. They work on nice days.
With clean fields there is no need to winnow the berries anymore. Less handling of the fruit. Loaded trucks deliver the produce to the processing plant for weighing then processing.
Rocks are plentiful in most wild blueberry fields. Rocks can be removed in order for the field to be raked by machines.
Unfortunately ignorance or malicious mischief takes place too often.
Blueberry winnowing machines were used in the fields to clean the berries. One half bushel basket (when hand raked real clean) would fill one half bushel wooden box. The wooden baskets and boxes were replaced with 5 gallon plastic buckets and half bushel plastic boxes for durability, less weight and cleanliness.
Harvest begins in late July or early August. Rocky and hilly fields will be hand raked. The flatter and cleaner fields are harvested by machines.
Blueberries are stored in large plastic lined hardwood crates which are stacked in the freezer. Some berries may be laser graded at this time or stored for processing after the harvest.
The removal of stems continues as the frozen berries are paddled and vibrated toward a laser separator or storage container.
Sunnyside Farms Inc.
String is used to section off the field for hand rakers. Each raker is assigned a "row" which they are responsible to rake all the berries.
Raking Machines
The growth of the pruned bush slows in late July (tip dieback) and the development of buds begin where the leaf and stem join. The buds will be next years blossoms.
Excavator performing rock removal and land leveling. The rocks are grouped or placed in rows for pickup and removal by a front-end loader.
The blueberries are winnowed, washed and "individually quick frozen" know as IQF on the same day they are delivered.
Flail mowing
The harvested fields will start to turn soon after being raked. The colors are dull yellowish, rusty and brown with petal drop occurring sooner than the pruned fields.
Monitoring the fields helps prevention of harmful diseases if identified in the early stages.
Spring has arrived along with the emergence of new shoots of blueberry bushes in the pruned fields.The tips of the bushes are orange/yellow/red in color. As the summer passes they will become intensely green. Unfortunately some people drive through the fields destroying the next years crop. For whatever reason they do it, the damage is done and the cost can be severe.
30 pound box of frozen wild blueberries.
Fall colors are intense on the flaming red pruned fields.
This website is an informative overview of the process of helping the Wild Blueberry achieve the growth potential it deserves.
Below you can see the different shades of leaf color. The different shades of green can represent different clones which in turn can mean variations in the fruits shape, size, color, taste and abundance. The uniqueness of each clones' taste results in a pleasant experience for the taste buds.
After harvest and the first frost occurs prunning will begin in the form of flail mowing on smooth rockless fields while the rocky bumpy fields will be pruned by burning machines and then undergo rock removal and leveling (if affordable). The pictures below show some fields undergoing rock removal and leveling.
Sunnyside Farms Inc. is a 5th generation family run business. We have been growing Wild Blueberries for over 100 years. The prosperity and promotion of Wild Blueberries continues to be our our passion.
There are many characteristics about wild blueberries. Some wild blueberries are pear shaped, some are grape shape, some are sky blue, some are dark blue, some are black, some are pink. Each wild blueberry clone has a uniqueness in flavor. Whatever size, shape or color each handful is an explosion of wild wonderful tastes.
Wild Blueberries have been growing wild in Maine and the eastern Canadian provinces for thousands of years. Local native americans had many uses for the berry, both for diet and health. The health benefits of the wild blueberry are numerous.