Pound shop blueberry bush?

Mr. Vine Eye

hi all I bought a blueberry bush from Poundland today - one of the bareroots in a plastic bag with some green growth sticking out the top - inside a card sleeve.

when I unwrapped it to soak it before planting, inside the plant is one long brown stem which has been folded in on itself (top to bottom) a few times with the green growth at one end and some roots at the other.

It unfolded itself when taken out of the packaging.

When I plant it in its container - should I plant it as it came, folded . Or should I try and wind it around inside the container - assuming it's flexible enough for that. 

Im thinking the first thing I said (as it came) - but I wanted to check.

It's thrown me a bit just because it's not how I expected it to look!

thanks

Busy-Lizzie

What a poor little thing! You should plant the roots. I'm not sure, but I think all the long bit is the stem. Are there any roots coming off it, apart from at the bottom? I found a You Tube film with a weedy looking blueberry. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wKV8t5sJKw0

Mr. Vine Eye

Ohh, see I've planted it up to the green bit by winding the brown stem around as I put the soil in.

Wasnt sure if that would end up rooting along the stem.


Should I dig it out and replant it with most of the stem above the soil? 

Stick a bamboo cane in the middle or something to support the floppy stem.

Lyn

If it were me I would buy two or three from a good seller, nice bushy plants, you need more than one if you want fruit. That looks just too weak to be any good. It looks like it’s been kept in the dark. 

Busy-Lizzie

Actually I think the same as Lyn but I thought you wanted to save that one.

Jason milly

Me personally would wrap it back up in original packaging and take it back and change it for a different one , don't agree that budget shops sell bad stock I have had great purchases of cheaper shops and bad items of nursery just going through a sittution of strawberries out of 5 only 3 came up from super market all came up .

raisingirl

I would plant it to the original (pot) soil level, stake the stick and see if it sprouts from the base. If it does, cut off the long stick. If it doesn't, start again with a new one. As Lyn says, you need at least two anyway, so get two more that are a bit better cared for. Then give this one a stern talking to about it's options (live or die - it's up to you) and see what happens. It's obviously fairly determined to live, so it may just need a chance to thrive.

barry island

Another shout out for budget shops, I was only thinking yesterday how the spring Narcissi bulbs bought from Lidl all seem to have come up and are flowering beautifully. I have found that blueberry bushes are quite hard to get established in pots so I would rather buy mid to high range just to make sure that I was getting the best plants.

Lyn

I am also happy with pound shop Lidl  or Wilco plants and bulbs, just a bad choice with that blue berry.  Mine were only 1.99 each from J. Parker’s they grew on well. 

Mr. Vine Eye

Thanks, you couldn't see what it was like properly because the stem was folded up with the roots inside the plastic bag with compost. All you could see was the green growth out of the top.

So I assumed it was a short plant. Not a long gangly one that had been folded up!

At the moment its planted in a pot with the green parts above soil level and the rest below.

If I get it back out I'll just end up further damaging it so I'll leave it as it is and see what happens.

Hope it roots along the stem.

Not the end of the world! Although I won't be buying any more of these cardboard box plants!

Lyn

Those plants are ok, but you need to give them a good pull about, remove the sleeve etc.