It’s that time of the year when you can visit farms or farm stands and enjoy the bounty of the season. In this case we decided to enjoy blueberry season, which started the beginning of July, by picking our own blueberries at the Blueberry Patch in Mansfield, Ohio.
The Blueberry Patch is a family owned and operated business established in 1981 by Steve and Lisa Beilstein. The soil in these rolling hills is perfect for growing blueberries; sandy and acidic which grows delicious sweet blueberries that you can pick in July and August. They grow 27 different varieties of blueberries that ripen at different times which helps to make the picking season as long as possible.

Blueberry bush
Upon arrival and finding a parking space near the rows of blueberries (I suggest getting there as early as possible it does get busy!) you stand in line to tell them how many buckets you want, they write down your name along with the number of buckets you take and point you to where the picking is and what varieties are currently being picked. They ask kindly that you do not eat as you pick but we all know how hard it is to resist tasting a few.
When you’ve filled your buckets as much as you like, you bring it back to be weighed and payed for. Blueberries are priced at $3.70 per pound. You can pay a couple of dollars extra to keep the bucket (if you bring it back to use another year you get a discount) or they will put them in a plastic bag for you to take home.

Ripe and ready

Rows to be picked
If you aren’t a U pick kind of person you can purchase pre-picked pints, six and eight pound buckets. Of course they also offer all manner of blueberry edibles to buy along with the blueberries themselves such as jam, ice cream, pies and donuts to name a few. There were several people asking when the donuts were coming out – a popular treat apparently.

On the premises they also have a gift shop which has items for sale that are and aren’t blueberry related and the Blossoms Cafe which is attached to the gift shop in a greenhouse. They even have blueberry bushes to buy if you want to start your own patch at home. I wish I had the room and proper soil to do so. That would be wonderful.

Gift shop goodies

Blueberry jam

Blossoms Cafe
There is a new addition to the Blueberry Patch now, the 1285 Winery where besides buying some wine, you can have something to eat to go along with your libation of choice to enjoy either inside, or in nicer weather, out on the patio.

Winery patio

Wine slushies!
They offer several varieties of wine including blueberry. We all knew that just had to be one of the wines offered.

Wine choices
In my opinion there is nothing that compares to freshly picked fruit and vegetables and the Blueberry Patch is an ideal place to take the entire family to go blueberry picking. Remember that this is a farm and you will be walking up and down the rows of blueberry bushes on grass. They are adhering to all the guidelines set by the CDC to keep customers and employees safe which made me feel safe visiting.
The Blueberry Patch is located at 1285 W. Hanley Road, Mansfield, Ohio. Visit their website here to learn more about, plan your visit or maybe even order some of their blueberry best selling gifts like syrup or blueberry truffles. Yum!