Elizabeth is a heirloom from the mid 1900’s. It was once a prized variety which has been pushed close to extinction by newer cultivars.
If you read about Blue Crop on this website, you will get much of the back story on Elizabeth White, a woman who devoted her life to blueberries and cranberries.
Elizabeth was developed from cultivars that Elizabeth White helped to create. She searched throughout the eastern US trying to find the most flavorful and large size blueberries for Frederick Coville a scientist that was trying to find a way to cultivate wild blueberries. The cultivar “Elizabeth” was created by crossing cultivars produced by Coville and White with the goal of creating a blueberry with exceptional taste.
Elizabeth has lived up to the goal. It is said by many to be the best tasting blueberry of all the mid-season varieties. In fact, it not only has an incredible sweet flavor, it is also highly aromatic!
Here’s the lineage of Elizabeth. It is a hybrid of Katharine, Jersey, and Scammell. Katharine comes from crossing two wild blueberry bushes found in 1912. (They named the two wild bushes they found Sooy and Brooks. Those aren’t cultivars. They are pet names for bushes they found out in the forest.) Jersey is a cross between the wild blueberry bush Rupel and Grover, also a wild blueberry bush they found. Again these are not cultivars, just pet names. Jersey was produced in 1916. So thus far in this lineage, there are four wild blueberry bushes in the equation which were considered to have a higher than normal flavor profile. The third bush is Scammell, which was a cultivar released in 1931 by Frederick Coville. It was a hybrid he and White produced by crossbreeding some of their earlier varieties created from wild bushes. It was called Scammell because the Scammell and Sons Nursery Catalog offered it for sale to the public, a feat accomplished because of its berry size and flavor. So, Elizabeth has a lot of wild blueberry in its ancestry.
The bush will grow to be about 5 feet tall and can produce up to 15 lbs of nickel-sized fruit.
Quantities are limited on Elizabeth.
Also be advised that some sources tell us Elizabeth is only hardy to zone 5 and others say zone 4 (down to 26 degrees F). We are not conclusively sure at this point. Therefore, if you do buy Elizabeth, it may be advisable to give it some protection if it gets extremely cold.
Ripens mid-season between Patriot and Nelson. Please be advised that this cultivar may not bear as much fruit per bush as many of the others.
