Maine blueberry crop looks solid

BANGOR, Maine (AP) - Maine, the nation's largest producer of wild blueberries, is boasting a healthy crop despite heavy rain through much of the summer that delayed the start of harvest by a week.

David Bell, executive director for the Maine Wild Blueberry Commission, says it'll be a solid, but not record-breaking, crop. It remains to be seen whether it'll reach early-season predictions of 100 million pounds.

Wild blueberries are a $250 million economic engine in Maine, most of it in Washington and Hancock counties.

Officials told the Bangor Daily News that the state managed to avoid major problems from a leaf fungus that cropped up for the first time this summer. Bell says the fungus could be a problem in the future. It has been prevalent in Canada, particularly in Nova Scotia.