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I read the post about "Berries from seed" with interest. Blueberries are very popular here, but we would have to live closer to the nearby mountain to stand a chance.
Have pieces of info on growing Raspberries and would like to hear from any growers. Anything I should avoid doing, that sort of thing. I'd like to grow a row along a short east facing wall and wonder how close they should be planted to it.

Hi Adekun. This coming season will be my first crop. I got the plants from a friend of mine. I planted them and they grew great. About 1.5metres.
I built a raised bed of 150x25 timber as my place gets very wet in the winter. There are two season types of raspberries, summer harvest and autumn harvest type. The autumn type you cut down to ground level each year, and the summer type you cut the previous years fruiting canes only. Mine were the summer type, but I cut them all down by mistake and so had to wait until this coming season to get any fruit.
The only down side of raspberries is that they sucker everywhere and have to be hoed or cut out the ones not in the line where you want to grow them. You will need wires to support them that will be about 150mm apart. The first set of wires need to be about 750mm up off the ground, the next set about 1.1m up and the top row about 1.5m. When the canes grow they need to be cut off about 1.8m high. Plant the raspberries about 400mm apart.
Raspberries need plenty of air around them, so don't plant them too close to the fence. Also you will need to be able to harvest the fruit on the fence side of the canes. Happy planting.

Robin

I'm in my 2nd year of growing raspberries and I've got both autumn fruiting (starting now) and summer fruiting, which finished a little while ago and I've cut out the fruited canes.

However the new canes (for next year's fruit, supposedly) on the summer raspbs are fruiting now too - so I am very confused!

They are complete thugs as plants go and I had to dig out a trench to get rid of the roots which had spread out more than a metre in all directions and were coming up all through my strawberries in the same bed.

We erected a frame with wires at the height given in a book but I think it would have been better having the wires lower because most of the canes don't get as tall as the top wire!

I have also learnt that they don't grow in nice little rows like the diagrams in my book but they just emerge from the soil where they feel like it and come up through the grass the other side as well.

Anyway here's a photo of them taken recently!

Millymollymandy wrote: We erected a frame with wires at the height given in a book but I think it would have been better having the wires lower because most of the canes don't get as tall as the top wire!

I think the height depends very much on variety and growing conditions. My friend has some in her garden that she'd need a ladder to pick... Oh well, the birds can have the top ones.

Thugs is a good desciption, I planted mine way too close to the veggie plot and gooseberry and have to dig up the shoots frequently- mind you my friends seems to like the resulting plants which take really easily.

As for height, I have had mine 4 years now, maybe 5 and it really depends on the year. Last year they were really quite stunted, the dry weather I guess, this year they are 7ftish, the other years they ahve been something in between so brave person to write that book!

I do love them though, thats my treat in the garden nibbling at the raspberries. Funnily enough I don't bother netting as the birds race me for the first few weeks then lose interest, and this variety seemt o give me fruit June til frost!

Peggy Sue wrote:Thugs is a good desciption, I planted mine way too close to the veggie plot and gooseberry and have to dig up the shoots frequently- mind you my friends seems to like the resulting plants which take really easily.

Also popular goat feed!

Some of my friend's are 12 feet... And they've always been that height, since she planted them 3 years ago. It's just that one variety though - all the others are shorter to varying degrees.

Ina wrote:-

Some of my friend's are 12 feet... And they've always been that height,

Do they play basketball?

Robin

Thank you to everyone for the hints. I suppose I should think about the size of PYO bushes rather than something a few feet high.
Along the wall seemed a nice place, but it seems I'm going to have to stick them a few feet in front. Got a lot of digging to do since that places them too close to the asparagus.
I've got eight plants, now without leaves. It's 36°C in the day and 30°C at night. The dewpoint in the early twenties. Perhaps for once, not so happy planting.

ohareward wrote: Do they play basketball?

Robin

Good idea - I shall suggest that!

Mine are poking out of the top of the fruit cage this year but barely made it to my knees last year. So I think they are very dependent on the amount of rain.

Not had so much fruit this year as last which I am putting down to the weather.

Cheers
Zoe

if you had to choose, would you go for summer fruiting or autumn fruiting?

I've got some of each. Last year they both did well. Trouble is now I can't remember which is which so I've no idea whether it's the summers fruiting now or if I am on to the autumns already.

Zoe

red wrote:if you had to choose, would you go for summer fruiting or autumn fruiting?

I can't really say - I'm actually grateful for having both varieties of raspbs (and strawbs) because they have really been the only eating fruit we have had so far - still waiting for plums, peaches, apples and pears. The currants have gone in the freezer but not sure what I will do with them now!