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Re[2]: Raspberries

Square Foot Gardening List - http://www.flinet.com/~gallus/sqft.html

Hello William

On 04-Jan-99, you wrote:

> Square Foot Gardening List - http://www.flinet.com/~gallus/sqft.html
> 
> I think the answer to your question is that it depends on what type they 
> are.  
> 
> If they are June bearers, that means the berries grow on second year 
> canes.  What you should do is (1) on those canes which have already born 
> fruit, cut them out of your berry patch.  You can't miss them.  By late 
> winter, early spring, they look like very dead, dry canes.  Next seasons 
> fruit will grow on the canes that came up this past summer.  My 
> experience is that you will usually be better off if you prune those 
> canes when they are about four feet tall (usually sometime in July here 
> in zone 5.  That encourages the canes to develop side shoots, ergo more 
> berries the next year.  It is probably too late to do much about those 
> canes that grew this year.  
> 
> If you have ever bearers, you get a small crop in the summer and another 
> crop in the fall, (What actually happens is on the first year cane, you 
> get a fall crop;  you also get a small crop the next summer on the 
> second year of that cane, then it dies)  You should not prune this type.  
> When I grew raspberries, I never bothered with the summer crop on this 
> type which I thought was inferior in any case.  Every fall, I mowed the 
> canes to the ground (only do this for the ever bearers.  If you mow your 
> June bearers, you will never get a raspberry).  It seemed to help keep 
> out virus diseases.  Also made it a lot easier to manage the berry patch 

   I remember reading some years ago about a successful experiment
conducted in England where commercial raspberry growers were mowing each
half of their raspberry plants every second year. Apparently, this
produced a crop equal to the old system of pruning out only the second
year canes as the plants produced twice as much fruit each second year;
and, of course, saved on a lot of labour.  Maybe worth a trial.
 
Regards,
Noel.
-- 
Noel & Paula Jackson
Organic Growers of Strawberries & Other Produce at
NATURE'S ACRES,
Taradale Rd., Dannevirke, New Zealand.
 WebPage: http://members.xoom.com/NoelJackson/Home.html


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