[Susannah]

I have two blueberries bushes in pots, they are about 3 years old now. One of them dropped all its leaves in July last year, I persevered with it and although it didn't flower so no blueberries this year it does have healthy leaves.
The other one seemed ok and flowered and I have loads of fruit coming but it too has dropped its leaves in the last week or so! Will the fruit carry on developing. I water them from my water butt and not from the tap and feed them in the spring with a ericasious (sp) feed. I also have a new plant planted last autumn which is ok at the moment. What am I doing wrong?

[BabbyAnn]

It sounds like it could weather related - we had a heat wave in July last year, and a sudden temperature hike recently - I wonder if they are not getting enough water (you may think you have given them water but the compost round the roots might be dry).  Blueberries do well when given plenty of water.

The other possibility - although I couldn't explain the recovery of the 1st one - is that you may have vine weevil grubs in the compost.  They do tend to attack plants in pots.  If the roots are damaged, the plants may not be able to take up enough water during spikes in temperature, and in "drought" conditions, sometimes they offload leaves to conserve water.

[JayG]

I can only offer sympathy rather than help, because although something similar has happened to one of my 2 blueberry bushes I don't know why.

They are both planted in the ground and have been for at least 5 years, probably more, so I tend to just let them get on with it, so although the affected one has very few leaves I can't even say for sure whether it has lost them or failed to grow them in the first place this year. 

I do my best to keep the pH low, but have never been more than partly successful, although they do seem to have put with it - the affected plant is possibly finally demonstrating its resentment of the growing conditions, and needless to say it's the one which has consistently far outperformed its 'companion' in terms of fruit ever since I got them. 

It was covered in flowers this spring and most of them seem to have set - I can't do more than try to buy a suitable ericaceous feed this afternoon to try to give it a boost, and then just hope for the best.

[Growster...]

We have a blueberry, which we moved and replanted in a pot at home, and it immediately dropped everything and the stems went brown!

In spring this year, I noticed the tiniest of leaves right down at the base, and it's got away again now, although there are no flowers!

They are pretty fickle, but worth getting to know!

[Susannah]

Thank you for all your input. Will keep watering and see what happens!