Time to focus on the blaeberry

The traditional Scottish blaeberry is being brought under the microscope as plant breeders look to producing the next “super fruit”.

The past decade has seen the acreage of the Scots favourite’s close relative, the blueberry, increase dramatically as consumers cotton on to its healthy eating image.

Last year, in the £1 billion plus sales of soft fruit in the UK, the blueberry was the top performer with double digit growth.

However, Dr Susan Mccallum a soft fruit breeder at the James Hutton Institute, Dundee, told growers attending a meeting at the institute that all the varieties of blueberries being used by commercial producers had been brought in from either the US or New Zealand and they were susceptible to a range of diseases.

In addition, the yield can be unstable. “We need to see if we can develop the native blueberry. It comes from the same family but its fruit yield is quite small. We need to develop its genetic background.”

She added it was a longterm project but the potential rewards were high as supermarkets were very much on the hunt for new products that have healthy eating benefits.

As part of the project, she and her colleagues are gathering information on blueberries growing in the wild. She said there was quite a yield range with the various clumps of wild fruit.