Advice for front garden beginner - Ask Extension
Hello, I am a beginner gardener. I purchased a blueberry bush to plant. I am wondering what I can plant with it that is a good companion plant. I want...
Knowledgebase
Advice for front garden beginner #929250
Asked April 22, 2026, 3:16 PM EDT
Hello, I am a beginner gardener. I purchased a blueberry bush to plant. I am wondering what I can plant with it that is a good companion plant. I want my garden to look beautiful. Not sure of how to plan the layout of what to plant, or where I should place the blueberry bush. I hear blueberry bushes need a specific soil, so want to make sure I want to play something beside it that can tolerate that soil. I’ll attach my flower bed and the blueberry bush I purchased.
Baltimore City County Maryland
Expert Response
You may want to work with a landscape designer for any type of layout and plant arrangement/selection tips, but we can provide some tips.
You can find cultivation information on our Growing Blueberries in a Home Garden page. While blueberries can someone self-pollinate their own flowers in order to produce fruit, they fruit best when they can be cross-pollinated by another blueberry. That pollen partner should be a different cultivar so the genes in the pollen are slightly different so they are compatible for cross-pollination. You could choose, for example, another similarly-sized blueberry cultivar that is not 'Peach Sorbet' to be the pollinator, so each shrub would then fruit well.
Make sure the planting site receives full sun (6+ hours of direct sun in summer) for best fruiting and aesthetics (like fall foliage color). Blueberries in the wild tolerate some dappled shade, but may not fruit as well or stay as dense in terms of leaf growth. Also make sure the location you plant it can accommodate its mature size, which according to the breeder of this variety, sounds like only about 2 feet, which is pretty compact for a highbush blueberry (in the wild, they'd get several times this height and width). Within the overall season of fruiting, blueberry cultivars ripen at different times, with some being early-season ripeners and others being late-season or in between. This allows you to choose a variety as the pollinator that happens to ripen at a different time, if you want to extend the harvest season a bit. ('Peach Sorbet' supposedly has a mid-season ripening time. If you chose a late-season or early-season companion variety, then you could get a couple more weeks of berry production from the planting because one shrub's fruit would ripen before the other's.) There are many dozen blueberry cultivars on the market today, so you have lots of choices.
The soil should be fairly acidic for blueberries to thrive. This can be measured with a laboratory soil test, and we can help to interpret the test results if needed. The soil's acidity can be adjusted if need be, though it's a slow process, but it won't prevent you from planting this spring if you need to make adjustments over time.
Be mindful of where that roof downspout outlet empties. During periods of wet weather, that extra influx of water near the root zones of any plants nearby might be too much for them to handle and they could essentially drown. Blueberries appreciate consistent soil moisture (during a drought, they'll need some supplemental watering), but you generally want to avoid flooding the root zone, and extending a drain pipe further away from a planting bed is usually a good idea when possible.
A soil test will also measure organic matter content, and if it's low, amending the soil when you plant with compost will help plants over the long run. Mulch used to cover any bare soil after planting will help suppress weeds (which, aside form aesthetics, compete with plants for moisture and nutrients), add more organic matter as the mulch slowly decomposes, protects the soil from strong fluctuations in soil temperature, and keeps it from drying out as fast in hot or dry weather. A mulch layer only needs to be about 2 to 3 inches thick to provide those benefits without smothering roots.
Give the blueberry shrub enough room to mature without getting too crowded by any plants you'll put around it. Since they won't want their roots disturbed regularly, pair it with other small shrubs or perennials (because they don't need replanting each year the way annuals would). As for what to plant alongside them, that's up to you and your aesthetic (what is "beautiful" is different for each gardener...some people prefer a simple look with symmetry and spaced-out plants, while others prefer a wilder, dense, lush look with many different plants). Just make sure companion plants can take the same conditions of summer sunlight level, soil moisture and drainage, and in this case, any acidity adjustments used to keep the blueberry thriving. There are many native and non-invasive plants to choose from (too many to list). One good resource for native plants is the Maryland Native Plant Guide for the Piedmont Region, which you can access online via the linked page.
Lastly, make sure the plants are protected with fencing if deer regularly visit the yard to browse, as they can eat blueberry foliage (and fruits). Birds also enjoy blueberry fruits, and if you need to shield the shrubs from them as the berries ripen, using insect mesh netting can be one way to cover them without denying the plants too much light or airflow. (The shrubs can't be covered with insect-blocking material in spring, as bees need to access the flowers to pollinate them.)
Don't be alarmed if the plant looks healthy but doesn't fruit much (or at all) this year or next year. It takes some time for fruit trees and shrubs to settle-in and establish a good root system, and they save energy by not fruiting much during this period. Key to getting new plants established is attention to watering, so focus on monitoring the soil around the roots for moisture and watering as needed when it starts to feel too dry to the touch a few inches below the surface. The linked page has more watering guidance.
Miri
You can find cultivation information on our Growing Blueberries in a Home Garden page. While blueberries can someone self-pollinate their own flowers in order to produce fruit, they fruit best when they can be cross-pollinated by another blueberry. That pollen partner should be a different cultivar so the genes in the pollen are slightly different so they are compatible for cross-pollination. You could choose, for example, another similarly-sized blueberry cultivar that is not 'Peach Sorbet' to be the pollinator, so each shrub would then fruit well.
Make sure the planting site receives full sun (6+ hours of direct sun in summer) for best fruiting and aesthetics (like fall foliage color). Blueberries in the wild tolerate some dappled shade, but may not fruit as well or stay as dense in terms of leaf growth. Also make sure the location you plant it can accommodate its mature size, which according to the breeder of this variety, sounds like only about 2 feet, which is pretty compact for a highbush blueberry (in the wild, they'd get several times this height and width). Within the overall season of fruiting, blueberry cultivars ripen at different times, with some being early-season ripeners and others being late-season or in between. This allows you to choose a variety as the pollinator that happens to ripen at a different time, if you want to extend the harvest season a bit. ('Peach Sorbet' supposedly has a mid-season ripening time. If you chose a late-season or early-season companion variety, then you could get a couple more weeks of berry production from the planting because one shrub's fruit would ripen before the other's.) There are many dozen blueberry cultivars on the market today, so you have lots of choices.
The soil should be fairly acidic for blueberries to thrive. This can be measured with a laboratory soil test, and we can help to interpret the test results if needed. The soil's acidity can be adjusted if need be, though it's a slow process, but it won't prevent you from planting this spring if you need to make adjustments over time.
Be mindful of where that roof downspout outlet empties. During periods of wet weather, that extra influx of water near the root zones of any plants nearby might be too much for them to handle and they could essentially drown. Blueberries appreciate consistent soil moisture (during a drought, they'll need some supplemental watering), but you generally want to avoid flooding the root zone, and extending a drain pipe further away from a planting bed is usually a good idea when possible.
A soil test will also measure organic matter content, and if it's low, amending the soil when you plant with compost will help plants over the long run. Mulch used to cover any bare soil after planting will help suppress weeds (which, aside form aesthetics, compete with plants for moisture and nutrients), add more organic matter as the mulch slowly decomposes, protects the soil from strong fluctuations in soil temperature, and keeps it from drying out as fast in hot or dry weather. A mulch layer only needs to be about 2 to 3 inches thick to provide those benefits without smothering roots.
Give the blueberry shrub enough room to mature without getting too crowded by any plants you'll put around it. Since they won't want their roots disturbed regularly, pair it with other small shrubs or perennials (because they don't need replanting each year the way annuals would). As for what to plant alongside them, that's up to you and your aesthetic (what is "beautiful" is different for each gardener...some people prefer a simple look with symmetry and spaced-out plants, while others prefer a wilder, dense, lush look with many different plants). Just make sure companion plants can take the same conditions of summer sunlight level, soil moisture and drainage, and in this case, any acidity adjustments used to keep the blueberry thriving. There are many native and non-invasive plants to choose from (too many to list). One good resource for native plants is the Maryland Native Plant Guide for the Piedmont Region, which you can access online via the linked page.
Lastly, make sure the plants are protected with fencing if deer regularly visit the yard to browse, as they can eat blueberry foliage (and fruits). Birds also enjoy blueberry fruits, and if you need to shield the shrubs from them as the berries ripen, using insect mesh netting can be one way to cover them without denying the plants too much light or airflow. (The shrubs can't be covered with insect-blocking material in spring, as bees need to access the flowers to pollinate them.)
Don't be alarmed if the plant looks healthy but doesn't fruit much (or at all) this year or next year. It takes some time for fruit trees and shrubs to settle-in and establish a good root system, and they save energy by not fruiting much during this period. Key to getting new plants established is attention to watering, so focus on monitoring the soil around the roots for moisture and watering as needed when it starts to feel too dry to the touch a few inches below the surface. The linked page has more watering guidance.
Miri
