Wild blueberry farms across Maine suffer as climate change upends growing seasons

Last summer, the wild blueberry fields at Crystal Spring Farm turned red prematurely.

A severe drought affected most of Maine, causing distress to the blueberry plants at Seth Kroeck’s farm near Brunswick. The leaves changed color too early, and the berries shriveled before ripening.

The 2025 harvest was nearly a complete failure.

“We got about 7 percent of our expected harvest,” said Kroeck, 55. Standing in his fields in April, he pointed to the new growth, just a few inches high, and remarked that last year’s yield was “a lot of raking with not a lot to show for it.”

This was the most recent in a series of harsh weather events impacting the 72 acres of wild blueberries at Crystal Spring Farm.

“In the last seven years, we’ve lost the crop three times, almost completely,” he added.

As climate change progresses, such losses are becoming more frequent for wild blueberry farmers, with solutions being costly, according to experts.

Maine’s quintessential fruit

Wild blueberries, a staple of Maine like lobster rolls or whoopie pies, differ from the blueberries found in grocery stores.

They are smaller, have a more intense flavor than cultivated blueberries, and are typically frozen rather than sold fresh.

Nearly all of the United States’ commercially sold wild blueberries come from Maine, with the industry harvesting about 88 million pounds in 2023, generating $361 million in revenue for the state, as per the Wild Blueberry Commission of Maine.

“It’s really something that’s a backbone industry to the state and a part of the state’s character,” Kroeck stated. Originally from St. Louis, Missouri, Kroeck grew up gardening and eventually pursued a career in agriculture. He studied printmaking in college, a degree he humorously notes he uses daily on the farm.

Wild blueberry patches, a native North American fruit, often predate the farms that now cultivate them.

“The blueberry plants have been there for millennia, and they have been cared for by generations of farmers before me, and then the Indigenous community [before that],” said Kroeck, who also grows row crops and pasturage.

Each bush produces fruit biennially, so farmers typically harvest half their acreage annually. Known as “lowbush” blueberries, these plants grow densely on nutrient-poor soils, primarily in eastern Canada and New England.

“Blueberry soil is not nutrient-rich. Nothing else wants to grow there … but wild blueberries love it,” said Rachel Schattman, a professor of sustainable agriculture and leader of the Agroecology Lab at the University of Maine.

Schattman, 43, began working on vegetable and dairy farms in high school and continued through her master’s degree. She operated a commercial vegetable farm for a decade while pursuing agricultural research and earning a doctorate at the University of Vermont.

The financial difficulties of managing a small farm led her to pursue research full time. She worked with the USDA on climate change’s impact on agriculture before moving to Maine in 2020, where she first encountered wild blueberries.

“It holds a really special place in the culture of Maine,” she noted.

Each blueberry patch exhibits genetic diversity, not a single monoculture. This diversity is visible and tasteable once berries start to develop, Kroeck explained.

“If you were to fly over our blueberry field while they’re fruiting, you’d see a lot of subtly different shades of blue and black,” he said.

Despite their resilience, wild blueberry farms face challenges from recent temperature and precipitation extremes, causing industry-wide concern.

“It would be a real cultural loss to have fewer wild blueberry farms and fewer berries available in the future,” said Lily Calderwood, a wild blueberry expert at the University of Maine Cooperative Extension, focusing on disease and pest management.

Raised in Massachusetts and fascinated by agriculture during a Cape Cod cranberry bog visit, Calderwood, 39, worked at the Earthwatch Institute, earned her doctorate at the University of Vermont, and later joined the Cornell Cooperative Extension before moving to Maine eight years ago.

Stressed seasons

Maine’s wild blueberries face a climate hotspot, partly due to rapid warming in the Gulf of Maine, Schattman stated. According to 2021 research, the state’s blueberry barrens are warming faster than the state overall, especially near the coast.

In response, berries ripen earlier, and farmers might miss part of their harvest if caught off guard. Calderwood said the crop used to be harvested in early or mid-August but is now ready by late July. High heat shortens the harvest window, requiring more labor and equipment to complete in time.

Kroeck mentioned he was caught off guard by early ripening in some years, leading to late harvesting, lower yields, and poorer fruit quality.

“As farmers, we’re very much attached to the season, and you kind of get into your ideas of when things need to be done,” he explained. Now, he spends more time directly observing field conditions.

Traditional knowledge, often handed down through farming families, is no longer sufficient for schedule planning, Calderwood noted. The farmers she works with have “absolutely no doubt” that climate change is already impacting their livelihoods.

Before moving to Crystal Spring Farm 22 years ago, Kroeck worked on farms in California, Massachusetts, and New York. He and his wife, a Massachusetts native, appreciated the Maine farming community. In the past decade, weather unpredictability has far surpassed the typical annual variations he was accustomed to.

“If you look at the research, it’s pretty hard to deny that we’re living in a period of changing weather,” he said.

Kroeck serves on the boards of the Organic Farmers Association and the Maine Organic Farmers and Gardeners Association, both addressing climate change’s impact on agriculture.

In 2020, 2022, and 2025, Maine faced severe droughts, plus a record wet year in 2023. Excessive moisture promotes disease and unchecked weeds, while droughts reduce flower formation and shrivel fruit.

Farms also deal with unexpected late spring frosts, which can kill flower buds as they form, Kroeck explained. Occasionally, warm autumns cause bushes to flower again before winter, depleting energy and reducing next year’s berry production.

Consistent moisture is crucial for wild blueberries throughout the growing season, Calderwood stated. This is becoming increasingly rare.

“The plant needs more water to keep the berries on the stems. And with less water and higher temperatures, they will shrivel and drop to the ground before a farmer can get to them,” she said.

Because wild blueberries fruit every other year, Kroeck noted that extreme weather can affect multiple seasons.

“A drought year is obviously going to affect the size of our fruit, but it’s also going to affect that other half that’s still in the vegetation state,” he explained. “If they’re stressed from water and from temperature, they’re not going to grow as robust as they would, and the fruit they put out is not going to be as big as it could.”

A cycle of loss

Last year, Maine experienced a wet spring followed by hot, dry conditions beginning in June. The drought intensified in August and continued through the rest of the year and into 2026. Calderwood described it as “a classic example of climate whiplash.” The Maine Wild Blueberry Commission estimates the industry lost $30 million in 2025.

“It was devastating for many farms in that region,” said Calderwood, who also serves on her town’s conservation commission.

Many blueberry farmers reported losing a third to half of their yields.

“There were reports of many, many acres of blueberries going unharvested because the berries had basically dehydrated on the bush,” Schattman said.

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Kroeck’s 2025 losses were more severe than most due to his farm’s exceptionally sandy soil, which doesn’t retain water well. He has crop insurance, which covers part of the loss, but it is partly based on previous years’ yields.

“If you have losses in close succession, then your average harvest goes down,” he explained.

Kroeck mentioned he applied for state and federal relief, but any funds would address his 2023 losses from a late freeze, which have been on the farm’s books for nearly three years.

According to Wild Blueberry Commission data, the state’s wild blueberry industry has declined in recent years, both in farm numbers and in total commercial field acreage, with financial stress as a contributing factor. Even one of the state’s largest producers, Wyman’s, plans to sell nearly 800 acres of blueberry fields this year.

“There have been some pretty significant hits to wild blueberries in Maine in general,” Kroeck said.

Researchers like Schattman and Calderwood strive to ensure climate change is not another reason for farms to close.

Modeling blueberries’ future

At the Wyman’s Research Center farm in Old Town, Schattman and her climate adaptation research team are simulating potential futures for Maine’s wild blueberries.

Researchers are halfway through a four-year study of how temperature, rainfall, and irrigation affect wild blueberries’ growing conditions — from soil health to pollination — and fruit yields. They’re also testing different climate scenarios for the end of the century to see how the plants handle extremely wet, extremely dry, or variable conditions.

The wild blueberries are grown under a range of conditions: Some have irrigation systems, some have mulch to slow moisture evaporation, and others have neither. Some bushes are grown in isolation, while others are clustered together to see how community and genetic diversity affect the plant’s resilience.

Schattman said open-top plexiglass structures passively trap heat around some of the blueberry plants on the farm, while others have heating coils to simulate heightened temperatures.

“We’re collecting a massive amount of data,” she said.

Irrigation and, to a lesser extent, mulching are already showing promise in reducing drought impact. Mulch barriers reduce soil temperatures, lower the risk of disease, and slow weed growth, but they aren’t enough to avert the effects of a severe drought like 2025.

“[Mulching] is a really healthy thing to do for our fields,” Calderwood said. “It can be used as a buffer for drought, but it cannot replace irrigation.”

Irrigation can be difficult with wild blueberries, since their preferred soil often isn’t great for building wells or installing pipes, Schattman said. Most small growers don’t have irrigation systems, leaving them vulnerable when droughts overlap with the growing season.

“Obviously, it’s useless to install an irrigation system if you don’t have a reliable water source,” she said.

When the climate adaptation study is complete, Schattman said she hopes to have data that can create a roadmap for farmers to keep their crops healthy in future conditions.

Calderwood’s work at the University of Maine Cooperative Extension overlaps with Schattman’s research, but much of it is hands-on in the fields of local blueberry farms.

This summer, Calderwood will be working with a large producer, Brodis Blueberries, to see how plants develop in irrigated and non-irrigated portions of their fields, and whether they show signs of stress during dry periods.

It’s key to figure out when the timing of irrigation can make the most impact, Calderwood said, especially for farms that can’t cover their entire acreage or may only be able to afford irrigation once or twice.

“Every time the pump runs, it is an expense,” she said.

‘It’s always expensive’

Affordability is the roadblock that wild blueberry farmers keep running into when it comes to climate change, both Schattman and Calderwood said. From buying equipment to drilling wells to trucking in loads of mulch, major one-time investments are difficult for small farms with thin profit margins.

“Every farm needs irrigation, but they just simply can’t afford it,” Calderwood said.

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At Crystal Spring Farm, Kroeck is trying to apply the University of Maine’s recommendations. He has brought in over 100,000 square feet of mulch, which covers less than half of his 72 acres of blueberries. The Natural Resources Conservation Service, or NRCS, which is part of the USDA, subsidized some of the costs, which range between $5,000 and $10,000 each year.

“Farmers would not do that if NRCS was not paying for it,” Calderwood said.

Kroeck also bought irrigation equipment, which arrived in December. It cost $90,000 for the equipment and the new well, which will cover about a quarter of his blueberry fields.

“It’s always expensive, and it’s always a gigantic cash flow game,” he said.

Additional state and federal investment, from funding to technical expertise, could also fast-track irrigation for small farms, Calderwood said. But in the past year, funding has trended in the opposite direction.

The NRCS has lost funding and about a quarter of its staffing — more than 2,000 people — due to USDA budget cuts since the beginning of the current Trump administration. Maine also lost $15.5 million, intended for a pilot program that would have brought water management practices to between 25 and 45 wild blueberry farms, due to federal grant clawbacks.

The state Drought Relief Fund has given grants for farmers to create water management plans, drill wells, or build storage ponds, but only two dozen of those were funded last year across all types of agriculture.

Meanwhile, profitability of wild blueberries is being squeezed by low market prices and competition from cultivated blueberry producers, Schattman said. Costs of fertilizer, labor, and equipment have risen too.

Farms are earning about 50 percent less per pound of wild blueberries than they were a few years ago, according to the Wild Blueberry Commission. Kroeck said he knows many small farms are having a hard time getting their products into large grocery store chains.

“The pricing is not very good as far as what those large chains are willing to pay,” he said. “The market for wild blueberries has been flat or has been decreasing somewhat, and that’s also very worrisome.”

Kroeck is part of a group of farmers looking into selling more berries fresh instead of frozen, a move that would open up a new, potentially more profitable customer base but would also require new equipment and additional labor.

Wild blueberry farmers need new markets or higher prices to afford expensive long-term projects, Schattman said.

“That’s much more difficult when you’re struggling to reach your sales goals,” Kroeck said.

In the absence of financial and technical support, Calderwood said it’s likely that only the largest berry producers will be able to protect themselves from a warming future.

“It’s a puzzle to figure irrigation out, and it needs federal funding,” she said.

With or without irrigation, Calderwood said she doesn’t think climate change will spell doom for a plant as resilient as the wild blueberry.

“Every year, there will be blueberries to harvest,” she said.

But whether there will be enough berries to keep farms in business is another matter.

“I hope that we’re going to be able to make the pivots that we need to make to save the crop,” Kroeck said.