Information

About:

Blueberry Fields Forever is a PYO (pick your own) field where you can have an amazing relaxing time picking blueberries with friends and family. Carolann is an expert in the art of self-sufficiency. Every summer she brings us organically grown beautiful blueberries.

Best time for it: Typically the PYO (pick your own) for blueberries will start around the end of the first week in January and go through to the second week of March.

What to bring / Recommendations: All you need to bring is yourselves, sunscreen and a hat as we provide picking buckets and bags to take your berries home in. Don’t forget to bring your lunch for the picnic area as we don’t sell food apart from ice creams.

Price / Payment: As to 2021 PYO blueberries are the same price as previous years @ $22Kg and you just pay for how much you pick. Accept cash and eftpos but not credit cards.

Address: 971 Whitemans Valley Road, Whitemans Valley (not the Akatarawa Valley).

Schedule: Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday 9am till 5pm.

Contact: 04 528 7581 carolann@blueberrypyo.nz

Please see the Blueberry Fields Forever Blog for picking updates or any changes to the hours.

History

“I never intended being a blueberry farmer but here I am and here’s how. There used to be an organic  PYO blueberry farm just down the road that had been there for years that the farmer had started as a retirement job but he was getting on in years and decided to sell and move to a retirement village. The new owners tried the PYO business for a year or two but decided that they really wanted the land for their horses so the blueberries had to go. There were rumours that they were going to be taken to the tip and as I woke up one morning I decided that they were coming to my place as my farm is just down the road and has even more appropriate soil for them and going to the tip, they were not.

One of the two original farmers who planted them thirty years ago was more than happy to come out of retirement and the other who hadn’t quite retired yet was equally as happy as they considered them their blueberries and no one else was to be trusted to move them. It took months for the weather to dry enough to get the machinery up to them for the shift so instead of them being transplanted in the middle of winter it was the middle of summer before the shift could begin. A team of wwoofers and myself had been up in the winter to radically cut them back in readiness for the move but as time went on they just considered that had been just a jolly good pruning.

Off the two farmers went with a digger, tractor and really large tractor trailer. The digger had already dug trenches at my farm for the blueberries to be planted into. Out of the two thousand shifted down eight hundred and fifty survived the February heat and transplant but at least they were given a chance. So oddly now I have a PYO blueberry farm which I really enjoy as I get to meet all the neighbors and loads of other really nice people as well. Some of the people were taken to pick blueberries by their parents at the previous farm and loved it so much that they now bring their children to the very same plants but in a different location.”

- Carolann

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