You really need to tell us where you live! 6b can be a lot of places.

For raspberries, you can't beat www.NourseFarms.com. I can't vouch for their other plants, because I've not ordered blackberries/blueberries from them, but I've never heard anyone say a single bad thing about the company. They’re in Massachusetts, but if your on the other side of the U.S., you might be better off with something more local.

For any nursery you are thinking of purchasing from, you should check them out first on Dave’s Garden Watchdog.com. They're an online nursery rating site. The easiest way to do this is to do a Google Search with the word "Scoop" and then the name of the nursery. So Google "Scoop Nourse Farms". If you don't find your nursery in question, it could be because they are very new, or very small, or it could also be the deplorable nursery which sued the Watchdog to have their name (along with their terrible rating) removed from the site. If you don’t find your nursery, which is rare, you want to be careful.

When you come back with your location, I'm sure others will help you out finding some other good nurseries which will work for you.

Good luck,
-Glenn

I am pretty sure I remember where Topnotchveggie lives; in Western Maryland. Right Mr. Veggie? It's nice country out there, but the winters are a lot more serious than the rest of Maryland.

Anyway, Nourse Farms does have a very good rep, though I have not used them. For blueberries I like Finch Blueberry Nursery in NC because of their reasonable prices and wide variety selection. Finch ships bareroot, so you have to be ready to plant soon after your plants arrive. For his location, Mr. Veggie should be looking at Northern Highbush.

Don Yellman, Great Falls, VA

They all arrived (not in little pots like other online orders, but in wet peat rich soil with their poor little roots exposed. There was wet newspaper over all 3, and they were wrapped in plastic, and then in one carton.

Burnt Ridge has good customer service and fast shipping. Just not sure they treated my plants too nicely. I have carefully planted them with lots of peat, enhanced with sulfate of ammonia in 3 gal pots. They are topped with a couple inches of mulch.

I have a neato little tool to check soil moisture. It was cheap. I got that online also. It's called a soil sleuth. Google it. When you think something is dry, because the top is, you would be amazed how damp the lower dirt is.

I'll be monitoring my blueberries because I know they like it damp.

Suzi

This sounds like you received bare root plants, which is what most (I believe) online nurseries ship in most cases. But, this is often not easy to glean from their catalogs. I have actually never received a plant in a pot from an online company… though I believe that will change in a couple weeks.

Were these bare root? If so, have you ever received BR plants before? Actually, I have never received any BR that had even a little soil. Usually just a bit of wet newspaper with the plant gel. I agree though, if you’ve never gotten BR plants, and you weren’t expecting them, then it could be quite a shock seeing the naked roots, etc!

Burnt Ridge has a very good reputation on Dave’s Garden Watchdog. The packing you describe is quite typical. If there are no other indications, then I’d expect them to do quite well, and you’ll be enjoying nice blueberries in a year or two.

-Glenn

Good luck,
-Glenn

Agree that Finch's is great for blueberries. Only caveat, if you order the little plants expect to lose a few.