The Best Blueberry Plants

Early Season Blueberries

• Southern highbush typically ripen about two weeks earlier than than rabbiteye and northern highbush. Among these, Cape Fear, Misty, O'Neal and Reville are some of the best. For rabbiteyes, Beckyblue and Bonita both produce berries with a good size, color and firmness. For northern highbush, Bluetta and Earliblue are two popular choices. Patriot is a good, hardy, half-high blueberry cultivar.

Early Mid-season Blueberries

• Blueray is one of the hardiest northern highbush blueberries, but Patriot, Spartan, Bluejay, and Duke are also good for vigorous, upright bushes with good berries. Brightblue is one of the best rabbiteye blueberries, but Columbus and Montgomery are good second choices. For Southern highbush, Jewel produce firm, good-tasting berries, followed by Sharpblue. For half-high blueberries, Northcountry produces good berries and makes an excellent patio plant.

Mid-season Blueberries

• For mid-season berries, Bluecrop is a very adaptable, disease-resistant northern highbush that has a long production season. However, Draper has better tasting berries, while Bluegold and Hardyblue are better for baking. The hardiest variety of half-high, Northland, also ripens midseason; however, Northsky is slightly more cold hardy. Tifblue is a popular variety of rabbiteye that is upright, vigorous and productive, but prone to cracking problems.

Mid Late-season Blueberries

• Brightwell is a vigorous, upright rabbiteye that produces excellent blueberries mid late-season. Among the northern highbush varieties, Darrow has the largest berries with a robust flavor, while Rubel has much smaller berries that are excellent for baking. Other popular northern highbush include Berkeley, Ozarkblue, Sierra and Chandler. Only a couple southern highbush ripen mid late-season including Southmoon, known for good-tasting berries, and Sunshine Blue, a dwarf variety with a low chilling requirement.

Late-season Blueberries

• For late season blueberries, your options are limited to either rabbiteyes or northern highbush. Powderblue is a popular variety of rabbiteye that is similar to Tifblue, but less prone to cracking. Elliot is a northern highbush with tangy berries unless allowed to ripen towards the very end of the season. Jersey ripens earlier and is one of the oldest varieties of northern highbush.