FIRST RESULTS FROM CULTIVAR TRIALS WITH HIGHBUSH BLUEBERRY IN NORWAY

Our objective was to select the best highbush blueberry cultivars for the conditions found in the main growing districts in Norway.
One trial is located in the Southern part of Norway, at The Norwegian Crop Research Institute, Division Landvik (58° 20’N 8°31’E), and the other in the Division Njøs in the Western part of Norway (61°11’N 6°52’E). The trials were planted in spring 1999. In both trials, 8 highbush blueberry cultivars (‘Brigitta Blue’, ‘Bluecrop’, ‘Blue Rose’, ‘Nui’, ‘Patriot’, ‘Puru’, ‘Reka’ and ‘Toro’) were being evaluated for vegetative and reproductive traits, including fruit quality.
The distance between plants in the row was 1.5 m at Landvik and 1.2 m at Njøs.
The distance between rows was 3.5 m at both locations.
The plantings were managed with black plastic mulch in the row and irrigation and fertigation through a trickle irrigation system. Both trials were harvested for two years.
So far ‘Reka’ and ‘Patriot’ have produced the highest mean yield with 2.0 kg and 1.5 kg per plant, respectively. ‘Puru’ yielded 1.0 kg and ‘Bluecrop’ 0.8 kg per plant. ‘Blue Rose’ has suffered from frost injury and had the poorest yield, 0.2 kg per plant, and cannot be recommended in Norway. ‘Nui’ had the largest fruits with a fruit weight of 2.94 g, while ‘Reka’ had the smallest fruits with 1.87 g. ‘Reka’, ‘Brigitta Blue’ and ‘Bluecrop’ got the highest scores for taste.

VIII International Symposium on Vaccinium Culture

N. Heiberg, E. Stubhaug

Vaccinium corymbosum L., yield, fruit quality, vegetative growth

https://doi.org/10.17660/ActaHortic.2006.715.45