I’ve been away for a few days, and when I wandered out this morning to pick some raspberries for breakfast, I was able to pick several pints. What I didn’t eat went in the freezer.
Rasps are easy to grow, but be sure to buy certified virus-free
stock. Plant them in full sun (though they’ll still bear if they get some shade).
I prefer to plant where I can mow around them, as they spread quickly. If you
do some research, you can find lots of ways to fuss with spacing, pruning,
fertilizing, etc., but I prefer to keep it simple. I put them in well-drained soil
with plenty of organic matter, make sure they get at least an inch or so of
water a week during the growing season, and throw down couple of inches of
compost or well-rotted manure in the spring. I mulch when I plant them, but
after the first year or so, they are growing so thickly they don’t need the
mulch.You are supposed to prune out the old canes but I never bother and always get a
good crop. That’s about it.
Most rasps bear in the spring/early summer. Some are
fall-bearing. The spring/summer ones fruit on canes that are in their second
year. The fall ones fruit on canes that have sprouted that year. Some do both, giving a small fall crop on first year canes and then a main crop on the same canes in the spring.
The fall-bearing ones can be mowed down each year, since they fruit
on the current year’s canes.
You know the berries are ripe when they slip easily from their core. Also, be aware that wineberries, a wild type of raspberry, are quite invasive. They grow wild in much of the eastern U.S. in the same ecological niche as blackberries. They don't really taste like cultivated raspberries, but are quite edible. They just don’t have the same great flavor.
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