THE HIGH BUSH BLUEBERRY 
By J. RUSSELL SMITH, Sc. D. 
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, doesn’t exactly make sense, but it’s real just the same. I’m 
talking about the fun | have picking high bush blueberries. There 
is no explaining it. It just is, and so we go on from there. 
Perhaps it’s the primeval hunting instinct. Some men get a 
thrill out of catching a fish, some from shooting a bird, some must 
stalk big game. But really now, did you ever see a blueberry 
bush standing up in front of you, as tall as you are or perhaps 
a little taller, and with great clusters of blueberries as big as 
small marbles, the ripe ones covered with that delicate sky blue 
bloom that you may have seen on some grapes? And then have 
you tickled those bunches with your finger tips and had these 
luscious morsels roll into the palm of your hand? If you haven't 
done that you have something coming to you. 
Perhaps you are a woman. Well this fun of picking blueber- 
ries is not a merely masculine delight. My neighbor, who is a 
grandmother, says it is fun to pick them and she is planting a lot 
of bushes now that her first bushes have proved themselves. 
And are the blueberries good to eat? If they were not they 
would not be selling at high prices for weeks and weeks each 
summer. 
Yet more! The bush.is a first-class ornamental for your lawn. 
The bright new foliage of May is followed by clusters of interest- 
ing flowers and then by clusters of berries. The flowers cause the 
bush to appear pinkish-white for a couple of weeks. The ripening 
berries make a multiple appeal, esthetic, economic, gustatory and 
give you a sense of achievement before you touch them. In 
autumn the leaves are dark red and stay on till freezing weather. 
After the leaves fall the bark on the new growth is rich dark red 
until covered by the new foliage—a 12-month beauty. Is there 
any other ornamental that is a real ornament and also a heavy 
producer of delicious food? 
Trout fishing costs money. Gunning costs money, so do most 
sports, but a blueberry bush soon pays for itself and then does 
it over and over again. They live on as apple trees live on, and 
keep sending up fresh shoots. 
They are very regular bearers. The terrible and untimely 
heats of March and the freezes of April and May 1945 wiped out 
my apples, peaches, grapes and cherries, but the blueberries 100 
yards away seemed never to hear about these troubles. 1946 
and ‘47 also had bad freezes but the blueberries were not 
touched. 
