Need Advice for planting Raspberries

[Orm Embar]

Hello dear neighbors,

After years of waiting for a place to call our own, we are happily planting our first patch of raspberries.

We are in the typical sandy loam that you find in Sebastopol hills. For those of you with raspberries . . .

Do you have trouble with gophers? Should I put a layer of hardware cloth down before planting?

Do your raspberries prefer sun or dappled shade?

Thanks for any insights you have to share!

-L

[ubaru]

Hello dear neighbors,

After years of waiting for a place to call our own, we are happily planting our first patch of raspberries.

We are in the typical sandy loam that you find in Sebastopol hills. For those of you with raspberries . . .

Do you have trouble with gophers? Should I put a layer of hardware cloth down before planting?

Do your raspberries prefer sun or dappled shade?

Thanks for any insights you have to share!

-L

I don't know the answers to your questions, but I just saw that thorn free blackberries are available. How cool is that? Here is a permaculture video filmed in Portland, OR full of ideas that may inspire you. And maybe you could write them via you tube.



Liz

[Orm Embar]

Thanks! (I'm already munching on various food forest ideas in my imagination)

I should have written a different topic title: Do gophers eat your raspberry canes?

Oh well . . . I've planted mine and we'll see how it goes.

Here's an inspiring film:


-L

I don't know the answers to your questions, but I just saw that thorn free blackberries are available. How cool is that? Here is a permaculture video filmed in Portland, OR full of ideas that may inspire you. And maybe you could write them via you tube.
Liz

[rossmen]

alas, the thorn free blackberries i planted were big, seedy and tasteless with a sour note. i understand they were developed by luther b himself and are why he imported himalayan blackberry stock.

[ubaru]

alas, the thorn free blackberries i planted were big, seedy and tasteless with a sour note. i understand they were developed by luther b himself and are why he imported himalayan blackberry stock.

Good to know rossmen,

Yep, in nature there's a reason for thorns; to protect the plant because it is especially sweet, or some other quality. Take away the protection and it compensates with less sweet fruit with less desirable characteristics.

What's the significance of Luther Burbank?

I could watch hours of permaculture videos for the happiness they provide me.

Liz

[Barry]

Luther Burbank is Sonoma County hero, with farms in Santa Rosa and Sebastopol, who revolutionized agriculture in his day (around the turn of the century) including creating over 800 new varieties of plants. More here.

What's the significance of Luther Burbank?

[Claire]

Hi Orm Embar, I, too, would plant raspberries first thing at a new homestead.
Here's my experience with that incomparable fruit. I planted my few canes in gopher wire because I figured just about any plant from the rose family is going to be pretty tasty to a gopher. As I used gopher wire (not chicken wire which is too big and not hardware cloth which would not be friendly to extending roots) my plants spread out underground from the original canes and popped up to fill in a spaceabout 2 ft wide and longer every year.
I was pleasantly surprised to find that the gophers did not eat the unprotected roots... yet!
Next row of raspberries I plant I will do the same by planting the originals in a wide(ish) and deep trench lined with gopher wire and allow them to grow out of bounds. This way if the gophers get the outside ones I'll still have the center canes.
I planted the everbearing which have 2 fruiting seasons in a year. Win/win and they were so tasty.

[Marty M]

Hello Liz and Rossmen,
This is a very interesting point of view that I hadn't thought of.
I had always thought that the thorns were to protect the young shoots and leaves from the browsers, like deer.
And that the berries were sweet so that the birds would eat them and disperse their seeds.
Modern agriculture, you never know.
Marty

Good to know rossmen,

Yep, in nature there's a reason for thorns; to protect the plant because it is especially sweet, or some other quality. Take away the protection and it compensates with less sweet fruit with less desirable characteristics.

What's the significance of Luther Burbank?

I could watch hours of permaculture videos for the happiness they provide me.

Liz

[rossmen]

as a lifelong forager i have always appreciated blackberries for their abundant, delicious fruit. as a landowner i grew resentful, because after a season or two of inattention they take over, and are a painful hassle to beat back.

then i got goats : ) now i see blackberries as fodder for the nannys. they eat all the leaves, then i cut the canes, the roots are tough, it takes two years to nibble them to death. young shoots and leaves are goat candy!

Hello Liz and Rossmen,
This is a very interesting point of view that I hadn't thought of.
I had always thought that the thorns were to protect the young shoots and leaves from the browsers, like deer.
And that the berries were sweet so that the birds would eat them and disperse their seeds.
Modern agriculture, you never know.
Marty