Welcome to our Farm!
Within view of Mount Sunapee and just a couple of miles from Lake Sunapee State Park, the Bartlett Blueberry Farm has become a traditional stop for folks enjoying the outdoor leisure activities the Sunapee area has to offer. We are pleased and grateful that many of our pickers have enjoyed the farm and our berries, not just for years but for generations!
We look forward to seeing all of our friends who have made blueberry picking a part of their summer. For those of you we've yet to meet, come on by and spend some time on the farm and be ready to harvest some of the best PYO blueberries you'll ever find!
Image by Alanna Hogan Photography
A Family Tradition
Bill & Heidi Bartlett
In the early 1970s Bill Bartlett would often pass the Calkin Farm on Bradford Road in Newport and see Tom Calkin, not a young man at the time, painstakingly planting infant blueberry bushes and “I used to wonder ‘when would he ever make a profit?’ ” Blueberries take about eight years to mature. Bill never imagined that one day he would be the owner of those blueberry bushes.
Ten or so years later, Bill asked Tom if he would ever consider selling the farm and “after receiving a firm ‘no’ for an answer, he went on to throw out a figure to Bill and wife Heidi. Bill was self employed (more on that later) and felt that the times of year when a blueberry crop required the most effort would fit into his work schedule well. Besides, the family needed a larger house for their two boys, and he and Heidi needed to begin a plan for their own retirement.
Being of good frugal New Hampshire stock, they put their thoughts together and felt with belt tightening they could make the purchase price. And not only did they get five acres of twelve year old blueberry bushes in the deal, they got the undying support of Tom Calkin with his encyclopedic knowledge of the fruit and his fanatical system for their care. The spectacular location of the farm house looking toward Mt. Sunapee at the top of the hill of blueberries was a bonus in the deal. In 2001 the farm was named a Farm of Distinction by the New Hampshire Department of Agriculture, Markets, and Food.
With the land, came 5000 mature blueberry bushes planted in rows, 300 feet long, eight feet apart, and 60 plants per row. Critical to a healthy and productive blueberry bush is fastidious pruning and, says Bill, “our detailed style of pruning is a holdover from Tom who gave us hands-on training in Spring 1985 after we bought the place.”
Pete Bartlett
Pete’s story is coming soon, he’s busy getting ready for the season - but will write it one of these days… :)
