blackberries

[Chuck52]

After seeing some at a you-pick-it, I'm planning on putting in some of the thornless blackberries this spring. I'd seen pictures in the seed catalogs for years of these really huge blackberries and didn't really believe them, but there really are some that are an inch in diameter and two inches long. Plus, they grow pretty well in my area (central Missouri). I've found relatively good plant prices at a couple of places in Arkansas, and one place sells root cuttings for about $0.35 @. I've decided on Navaho, in part because that variety is said to have smaller seeds. I want to do at least two varieties, and Arapaho was recommended as a good complement to Navaho because it is earlier bearing and would stretch the season to 6-8 weeks. At the local place where we picked, you could fill a gallon pail without walking more than ten feet along the row, and that included being picky about the berries. You could fill the pail without moving your feet if just any ripe berry would do! I'll be putting in about 100 feet to begin with, and if I can keep the birds and deer at bay, I should have enough berries for a cobbler or two. Anybody got any experience with these berries and know about the trade-offs between plants and root cuttings? I found a blurb on a University of Kentucky site that said crops started with root cuttings produced the same yield as those from plants, but it wasn't specific about time frame to achieve those results. I have questions in to the sources, but haven't gotten responses yet.

Chuck

[Stoneheartfarm]

The only thing I remember is that the quantity of next years harvest is determined by the quantity of water given this year. And, boy can they spread. You might do better putting in about 20 feet of row and then using your own shoots to expand the other 80 feet. Ours have were tilled over years ago and we still get new shoots every year.

Steve

[Chuck52]

Steve,

The new thornless varieties are said to be less prone to spreading. I'll be mowing between the rows and around the ends, so I hope not to have a problem with them taking over. Heck, if I can't control them I bet the !@#$% deer can!

Chuck

[Stoneheartfarm]

Seems to me when I ordered mine, they were billed as "suckerless". On the other hand, I ordered some Lilacs that were billed as "non-spreading". Boy, they not only don't spread, they barely grow. [img]/forums/images/icons/frown.gif[/img]

Steve

[Pat]

Maybe it is just my "taster" but I've never tasted any thornless berries that came close to my wild ones. I get lots of berries 3/4 inch long and some up to an inch. Unfortunately I bleed easily and can't seem to pick too long without getting bloody.

Pat

[Stoneheartfarm]

Pat,

I think it's like anything else, the closer you can keep to the native, original variety, the better it will taste. Wild strawberries beat tame ones every day, same with blueberries. Some of the best apples I've ever had came off trees that had sprouted up from cast off cores and never had any spray or pruning.

Steve

[Bird]

Chuck, I think you'll find that root clippings take two to three years to produce. With blackberries, the growth this year produces next year and dies. The growth next year produces the following year, etc. And, yes, the quantity and quality of berries you get depends on the water and fertilizer the plants had last year. I've no experience with the thornless varieties; literature from Texas A&M indicated they don't do well in Texas and the quality of the berries is not as good. But I had a blackberry patch about 50 feet long and 4 feet wide and harvested from 20 to 50 quarts a year for 8 years. I kept them from spreading simply by mowing around the edges and kept any of shoots mowed down. Then each year, when they were through producing (about mid-June in my area), I mowed the entire thing down as close to the ground as possible, threw out a few handfuls of cheap granular fertilizer, and watered them the rest of the summer. For maximum yield, you could leave the current years growth, but prune in early to mid-summer it so it'll branch more, and just cut out the old growth, but that's more work than I wanted to do, especially with the thorny type I had.

And Pat, you expect to bleed a little when you pick blackberries, don't you? [img]/forums/images/icons/laugh.gif[/img] I usually wore a heavy leather glove on my left hand to move vines around, and picked with my right hand with no glove.

[Stoneheartfarm]

Bird,

I'm glad to see you made it over here. We can use you.

Steve

[Bird]

Thank you, Steve. I just haven't had time to spend on this forum until recently. And I said the only place I'd found any wild strawberries was in Canada, and just remembered that I found just a few when I was doing a gas leakage survey across country in northern Pennsylvania ten years ago; probably only ate a dozen or less.

And speaking of walking that 5 miles to school; when I started school we lived on U.S. 70 west of Ardmore - right where I-35 is now. And I could have sworn we had to walk a mile west along U.S. 70 to the next crossroad where we caught the schoolbus. But the last time I was there looking around, that stretch of road has really shrunk; couldn't be more than a quarter mile now. [img]/forums/images/icons/wink.gif[/img]

[Pat]

Bird, Yet additional evidence in favor of plate tektonics. It proably was a mile that far back in time. [img]/forums/images/icons/grin.gif[/img]

Five miles uphill through the snow, both ways past hostile wildlife, barefoot, carrying coal or cordwood to heat the schoolhouse for all 8 grades in one room with no glass in the window, newspapers for wallpaper to try to reduce the draft and cracks beteween the floor boards so wide you could watch the chickens scratching under the building. Did I miss anything?

Pat