 My name's Neil Kelly. I'm a regional extension agent. I cover the southeast corner of the state of Alabama. I'm down here what we kind of consider the wiregrass region. And so a lot of things that I refer to and I talk soil types, things like that. It's a lot of stuff that I've dealt with during my career with extension. But, you know, with that, I'm supposed to be talking blueberry fertilization. So I'll get on with it. But before we can actually get down into the fertilizers and what type of fertilizer and how much to use. I think there's several other things that we need to keep in mind that are unique and different to blueberries. I'm trying to get my slideshow. Okay, there we go. First things first, you know, I think a soil test is absolutely necessary. It's just critical. We have to do it with blueberries. We all know that a blueberry is different in nature because it likes an acidic type soil. Much more acidic than most any other fruit crop could even stand or even survive in. And depending on what kind of reports you read or where you get your information from, I've heard things from four twos to five twos to four fives to five fives four ohs to five ohs four ohs to five twos. That number seems to kind of dance around a little bit. My take home from that is that absolutely your soul pH needs to be a 5.5 before you are less or less before you ever even consider planting. I would have my soul pH right before I even ordered my blueberry plants or bought blueberry plants. Because you know that soil pH is going to affect the nutrient uptake of the plant, things like that. So it all plays into a good sound fertility program. And that's something that it takes a long time to change in the soil profile. It's not something you just go out there and change overnight. So this was a real issue for some of my growers probably back 1010 or so years ago when they got into the blueberry business. This was a major issue for us and as Alina might have mentioned as you know she mentioned earlier about organic matter. You know some of those half a percent organic matter soils those are the very soils that we are dealing with down here is a. It's a extremely weathered coastal plain sandy type soil, very little organic matter. And obviously you know that organic matter is important when it comes to CC of the soils and its ability to hold nutrients and water and. For things to be available to the plant you know with organic matter you increase that organic matter 1% in your soil. And you can release up to extra like 15 pounds of nitrogen a year so as that as that organic matter increases that CC is going to increase that overall soil quality is going to increase. And you're going to get that much more efficient use out of the fertilizers that you do apply. One of the other things that we really didn't think about when we got started was our water but in this area we're pumping out a deep limestone aquifer. And so most of our well water is 8.0 or higher in pH and not only that the total alkalinity of that water was running somewhere around 150 parts per million. Any of the reading of research that you do on blueberries will tell you if you start to get over that 130 part per million total alkalinity of your water that you're going to have to do some type of water treatment. To your irrigation water what we were essentially doing was kind of slow dripping lime to them if you will and it just caused a real problem when you start talking about the kind of irrigation events that we have to have during our summer months to get us through. The way we did that was through sulfuric acid injections and that's not something that just everybody wants to get into so those are those are three things I would really recommend that growers kind of look into before we ever get as far as a actual fertility program. I'm putting this slide show together and doing some digging and all I ran across a few statements. That I found that were made by colleagues different universities different researchers and things and you know looking back to my experience that we had in this area with blueberries these are actually kind of that they seem simple but yet they're very profound statements or comments if you will and I wish a lot of our growers had had read some of these things as we got started but you can see here from Dr. crew and that's with over University of Georgia you know since blueberries evolved in areas with low nutrient content they can survive with a surprising low level of fertilization. However, over the test of time it has been clearly shown that for rapid growth of young plants and high yields of older plants a good fertilization program is necessary. And you know when you kind of look at that I remember people I hear people make comments say oh well blueberries they do good and poor soils they can handle poor soil conditions the poor the soil the better blueberries like it or things like that and and that's just not necessarily true. I guess they can survive but you're talking about commercial production we don't want to just be surviving we want to be thriving we've got to have high yields we've got to have high quality fruit. We've got to have highly marketable fruit in order for this thing to be economically feasible so we want to do a lot more than just survive. And I read it toward the end of that statement they say you know a good fertilization program and that doesn't necessarily mean a lot of fertilizer or put out large amounts of fertilizer. I think what they're referring to here is just a good stable steady sound fertility program. And I think that's kind of illustrated through this next slide, you know another comment they had mature rabbit eyes should not be over fertilized over fertilization results and excessive bush high. Additional pruning, poor quality fruit and excessive shading of the bush interior. You know as long as we're getting four to five inches of new growth on lateral bearing twigs should be adequate for good production. We're getting what we need out of that so you know just because a little bit helps a lot is not going to make the problem better. Here's another one I ran across by Jeff Williamson and Paul Irene University of Florida. Now blueberries respond best to frequent light fertilization they can be killed or damaged by over fertilization is best to begin on the lean side and gradually increase fertilizer rates as you gain experience with your soil type and the kinds of fertilizers you are using. And I think this is very true, you know we ran into a lot of problems early in the, our blueberry days if you will, when I first started with extension we had a lot of commercial growers putting in large acres orchards. And we ran into a lot of issues and some of those guys started putting out a little bit more fertilizer a little bit more fertilizer and of course they saw a little bit better growth and a little bit better growth. And then they kind of went overboard with it like well if a little is good than a lot is better, and they started pumping excessive nitrogen to these blueberries and so we wound up with this real big flush of growth. But the bottom line is we did not have a root system under it to support it so we kind of did full circle and we wound up right back where we were so I think these are kind of three very kind of profound statements that all growers should kind of refer back to from time to time just to sort of keep us in check. Talk a little bit about fertilization typically what we're talking about are the big three if you will the macro nutrients we're talking about our nitrogen our phosphorus and our potassium. And to look at these a little bit more you know nitrogen we all know that nitrogen is kind of responsible for the leafy growth for the foliage growth is very important in protein synthesis formation of proteins. We also know that nitrogen readily leaches in the soil, we lose a lot of nitrogen to volatilization. That's one reason when you get a soil test report you actually not get a soil content on your nitrogen level because they don't actually test for soil nitrogen the recommendation is known is just for based off of known crop needs because that's constantly changing that's highly variable in our soils. Your phosphorus levels. They're a little bit different we do actually test for soil phosphorus levels. And that's because the soil phosphorus it hangs around much longer than our other two elements. You can build up levels of phosphorus in your soil and at some point you may get to a situation where you don't need to add a phosphorus fertilizer and we might change our fertilizer analysis a little bit if you will as we as we move through production. But phosphorus is responsible for for root growth at age and root growth at age and energy transfer in the plant. And so you know phosphorus is important and blueberries do require and do benefit from application of phosphorus fertilizers. The next one there the potassium. You know it hangs around in the soil. Longer than nitrogen. But not as long as what phosphorus might be issues probably in a little bit larger quantities by the plant and what the phosphorus is. And so we're going to be making a little more potassium applications then we would phosphorus application so your nitrogen in your potassium is probably what the plant is going to use the most. And typically our fertilizer analysis are going to contain nitrogen and potassium they may or may not contain a phosphorus content. Talking a little bit about that on your soil test report when you get back your soil test report, it will rate your phosphorus and potassium levels as very high high medium low or very low. And so if those phosphorus levels are at very high or high. It's probably not going to call for any phosphorus fertilizer to be applied. Now if they fall in that medium to low range I think there's still a benefit for making that phosphorus application to your blueberries. My next statement there you know a one to one ratio fertilizer such as a triple 10 is kind of what a lot of people like to use a triple 10 triple 13. And you know that may not hurt anything but it may not be required if you're tall soil test say that you have high levels of phosphorus, you know you can leave out that middle number. You might find a cheaper source of fertilizer you might use something like a 1248 1648 something that's low in phosphorus fertilizer so we always tried to give generic fertility recommendations and fertilizer recommendations. But I feel like it's really something that should be looked at on a case by case specific basis for every grower because it's going to vary a little bit depending on where you are what type of soil you're on. And not only that whatever your expectation for the crop is now blueberry plants do respond better to ammonium or urea form of nitrogen. This used to be a big thing I used to always tell growers you know try to find something that's based from ammonium sulfate. Stay away from the ammonium nitrate blended fertilizers. That's really not as big a thing as it used to be because of all the bombing that took place at the at the at the. In Oklahoma City, I spit out in a second Oklahoma City and then Department of Homeland Security came out and they placed all kind of regulations on ammonium nitrate because of explosive natures and all that kind of stuff. And a lot of these companies shifted away from ammonium nitrate and went to what actually was a little bit cheaper forms of nitrogen anyway the ammonium sulfate and urea at the time were cheaper. They moved to those for their nitrogen source so most of your bag product is bagged out of a sulfate or either urea blend nowadays anyway. And again blueberries, they are sensitive to fertilizer burn so you'll see in a moment that we recommend to take it easy but you know the only way to get over that fertilizer burn once the damage is done is with time and time is money when you're talking commercial production. What we like to see is we like to see smaller applications smaller more frequent applications of fertilizers, something along the lines of say years one and two you might be making three to four applications a year. The developer root system as those plants start to mature and get out of those first two years of growth year three through six you may look at something like two to three applications and typically what it is that year six plants considered mature and we just kind of stay on the same fertility program from then on. You're either going by tissue analysis things like that to adjust your fertility program to fit your needs, but years one and two three to four application years three three six you might bump that back to maybe two to three applications a year. Typically you're going to start with bud break go all the way through harvest. You want to broadcast in a large circle around the plan a lot of times we really recommend fertilizing on a plant by plant basis that's the best way to do it. A lot of our growers and thing is is to sprinkle the fertilizer over a large circle around the plant don't just fill it right at the base of the plant run the risk of that that fertilize injury. 1648 1248 are all sources that you see at these big lawn and garden centers it's a common common formulation you find a lot of bag fertilizer and you know again they're well suited for blueberries what you notice is that ratio that 1648 ratio that 312 type ratio there is a little bit lower in phosphorus and for a lot of our soils that that's fine. Again your is often found mixed in these formulations your is a great fertilizer source for blueberries. You know smaller growers if you only have one or two plants that you need to fertilize you don't need a 50 pound bag of fertilizer. You may find these little azalea and camellia fertilizers at the big box stores and a little four pound bag. Typically that kind of stuff will work fine for you as well. Here's just several different labels I took some pictures. And if you'll notice if you look in the fine print or where they get that where they derive the nitrogen from. You see those are antimonical nitrogen urea nitrogen. And that's what I was telling you about this bag product nowadays. You're hard pressed to actually find ammonium nitrate bag anymore you just don't do it. If any of y'all remember that green fields fertilizer right there in the center 34 00. That's what they used to bag is ammonium nitrate and it was true ammonium nitrate it was a 34 00. Greenfields was just a brand if you will Red Fox Company put out. And what they did is they've gone back to using that same green fields brand again just because it was known by people. But if you look down that guaranteed analysis the total nitrogen yes 34% but 24.82 that comes from a urea based nitrogen. It's not actually ammonium nitrate in that bag anymore so the current day green fields 34 00 is not the same green fields 34 00 it was 10 12 years ago. And if you'll notice they also added a sulfur about a 10 or 12% sulfur content to that also so technically the analysis on that would be a 34 00 12 because it has that sulfur content. I just found that kind of interesting when I was at the hardware store the other day but anyway these would all be accept acceptable forms of fertilizer the one in the top right you see that that is a slow release fertilizer there. So, you know be careful with some of the slow release the cheaper product is not that reliable the rate of release on it is not that reliable. Now if you get the more expensive polymer coated products, the rate of release on those are a lot more reliable and it's a lot better product but it's going to cost a lot more so it may or may not be economically feasible on a large scale to use some of the slow release fertilizers. Again, we always have questions about organic fertilizers and we do have some organic growers. So you know you might look at something like cotton seed meal, which is going to be around the 632 type analysis you can put two ounces per plant per year of age. Up to about 12 or so pounds per plant you know the thing about organic fertilizers is they're typically very low in nutrient content. So you're going to have to apply more of them but just be careful you can overdo it on organic fertilizers just like you can conventional fertilizers. Some people may choose to use manures you know I put a big question mark out there because a you actually have to be very careful with manure and timing of application, because you're harvesting something that odds are going to be consumed fresh so you have to worry about the food safety aspect of using manures and there again manures are not consistent in their analysis so you would definitely need to send off samples and be sure of what you were putting out if you chose to use manures and if you are an organic producer then especially you've got to play into mind the national organic standard, the protocol for using manures and still meeting your organic certification so that's something you better dig into for you just jump out there and start using any type of raw manure product as a fertilizer. Again you know organic fertilizers may work for smaller growers or if you are a certified organic grower and you're demanding a higher price for your product and you're getting that premium price point for your product, but odds are they're probably too expensive for any commercial grower. This is kind of the beating potatoes I know what everybody's been waiting for you know how much fertilizer do we put per season, and this is kind of general recommendation guys, you know don't take this to literal because it can vary so much from situation to situation. You know when you're looking at one ounce of say triple 10, and that would be per application that's per plant per application so you think about it if we're doing two to three applications a year you're looking at somewhere around about three ounces of the triple 10. So I put the P out there with the question mark and that's phosphorus is what I'm talking about there, depending on what your soil test said, you know you could drop the triple 10 that that first year and you might just do a 1248 the first year also just depends on what our soil phosphorus levels are, but do make sure that you are in that that that medium to high range because blueberries do get a benefit from that phosphorus application. In year two you'd go to something like 1.2 ounces of a 1248 and again this is this is per plant per application. Year three jumped that up to 2.5 ounces year for 3.7 year five jump up to five ounces, and when you get to that six and older what we do is we kind of flat line at about a 6.7 ounces, and that's per application per plant. Because then what we want to do is make sure that they have enough fertility that they put on a good crop load that we're still getting good quality fruit off of the plant but we're not wanting to overdo it and a commercial setting. We're going to top our berries out year six is when they're considered mature that's probably we're going to start doing some cane renewal thinning things like that, because we want to keep that fruiting would somewhere under six feet in height or less for the harvesters to go through and if you're hand harvesting so that you can harvest most of that bush so around year six is where we start to kind of flat line on our on our fertilizer. You obviously you need to be pulling tissue samples send in tissue samples and adjust and tweak your fertilizer program to fit your needs dependent on your soil test result and your tissue analysis. Something that growers don't do enough is the tissue analysis, I think we should all utilize that a lot more than we probably do some very valuable information that gives you a snapshot in the middle of the season about what's going on. What your plant might be lacking in what you might possibly need to put out a little bit heavier because of your situation. And again just space those applications out you know make one application when the plant starts to grow and my part of the world that might be first of April. Again about six weeks later middle of June and again six or so weeks after August. What we want to do is we want to push a little bit of that late season growth the one thing you don't want to do is make that last application too late in the year. We want that plant time to take that last application up to put on a little bit of new growth, and then give that new growth time to harden off before we go into the winter because that's that hard that season growth will survive the cold weather, a lot better than really young tender fresh growth so you know don't don't make that last application of the year too awful late in the year you want a good six weeks or so between that last application and your frost date if you will, so that that growth has time to harden off some before winter. And I know that's a real real quick kind of brief snapshot on the fertilizer stuff. Like I say I get a lot of questions about about fertility and common fertilizer programs and that's probably one of the things that I really feel like should be looked at on the case by case situation and in particular instance but anyway with that David I'll turn it back over I know we're a few minutes over but if anybody has any questions you know feel free to to reach out to me or put those in the chat box. One thing I will throw out real quick small fruit.org that's the southern fruit consortium website. There's a lot of very valuable information on there and actually Dr Krueger and nezmith. They go really deep into fertilization on blueberries get really technical with it. And all that information is there on that on that website and that's excellent resource for our growers.