Growing raspberries and caring for them - I share my experience
Contents ✓
Raspberry planting and care - secrets and tips
The granddaughter the other day, cleverly squinting her eyes, asked: “Grandfather! Why on the pictures on the Internet that we are watching, raspberries always stand in beautifully slender rows, and we grow throughout the garden, and you hardly care for her? ” The next day I brought a bag of imported frozen berries from the store, took out a box of our raspberries from the refrigerator, and we arranged a tasting. “Yes,” the granddaughter said, “the store berries do not smell at all, and ours seemed to have been picked in the garden yesterday!”
And this story inspired me to think about this. Often I see in my favorite magazine letters of beginning gardeners, in which they share disappointment from the acquired novelties. For example, remontant varieties, in their opinion, are not tasty, do not ripen in a cool summer, are of low yield. Large-fruited, however, require special care, abundant chemical fertilizing and rapidly accumulate viral diseases. And the so-called industrial varieties, although viable, but the berries are small.
All this I myself experienced on myself, when 20 years ago I took up a garden and started chasing the scarce novelties, having read all sorts of smart books.
But I soon realized that all of them were written by agronomists working on large farms whose purpose is a huge harvest and profitability.
The same picture is observed today. True, now the Internet has also appeared, but there are too many popular articles, which, in essence, are ordinary advertising aggressively imposing fashionable novelties at three times as high prices. I was also convinced of this when not so long ago I decided to completely renew my garden raspberry collection and again began to be interested in promising varieties. And he saw that nothing new had happened. On the contrary! The quality of the seedlings has become worse, there are many regrowths, the old varieties are presented as new, full of viral and fungal diseases ...
What is the solution I propose?
Firstly, in many old abandoned gardens you can find today's forgotten varieties, which are able to give untold yields in any weather with a minimum of care. I personally always investigate such orphan plantations, and on some I managed to find real treasures.
And secondly, it helps me out ... friendship! In our town there are many experienced gardeners with raspberry planting. Poor, unregulated and diseased varieties, of course, do not please them, they carry out the selection of the very best. And always someone accidentally comes across a novelty that will delight its natural taste, unsurpassed smell or size of berries.
Therefore, in the summer I visit the gardens of our famous lovers, I taste, assess the raspberries and ask the owners permission to hang them on interesting plants for me so that in autumn they can exchange their layers for any sapling from my collection of berry or flowers. So I managed to plant a few dozen interesting varieties of raspberries. Rare of them I sign them with exact names, but most, given the high probability of re-sorting, just note, for example, as Big Yellow from Uncle Vasya. I'm not for sale, but for myself and for my grandchildren, just for health and good mood.
See also: Raspberry - growing from A to Z
Raspberry - taste and age
And why do we grow raspberries in our gardens? Once I began to watch the grandchildren, what kind of berries they are waiting for and what kind of friends their friends are drawn to, coming to visit us. At first, of course, they are looking for sweet strawberries. Then comes just fragrant raspberries, and in third place is a large sugary gooseberry.
And then he asked his faithful what berries she likes, which she considers most healing, collecting and freezing them for the winter. The answer was: honeysuckle, sea buckthorn, actinidia, black currant. Of course, in the refrigerator we have felt cherry, strawberry, raspberry, and much more, but I just focus on what children love and what adults prefer.
And my conclusion is this.
Raspberry in the garden is needed in order that it can be a long time with pleasure to consume directly from the bushes.
Berries should be tasty and fragrant, of different sizes and colors. So it’s more pleasant to collect it for children, organizing competitions on the topic of which berry is tastier, who found the largest. And it’s more interesting for grandmother to read the literature and find out that, for example, black raspberries have more anticancer antioxidants, yellow protects blood vessels from atherosclerosis, and red paraffin contains an acid similar to aspirin and protects the heart and brain from blood clots.
I try to stretch the consumption of this beloved by everyone - I plant early varieties in the warmest places of the garden, and plant the latest varieties in shady corners so that ripe berries can be picked from late June to August.
And it is obligatory on the best separate warm beds to cultivate the repairing varieties, so that in September, in the sunny Indian summer, to please the family with twigs of sweet berries. After all, it happens and we have a warm autumn, when these capricious remontant varieties become more delicious than the usual raspberries in July.
Now let's go through my garden, we'll talk about the secrets of agricultural technology. And first we remember that he loves raspberries. And she loves the sun and loose humus, consisting of decaying twigs and leaves. Such high-carbon organics are produced by mushrooms, as well as mites, columbols and other very small animals. In short, the roots of raspberries can not exist
without such a company. That is why, by the way, the forest raspberry is so tasty, zapashista and curative, and raspberries on beds with manure and mineral water, and is affected by rot. Well, there is not enough for her, poor, vitamins and bioactive substances, her roots can not synthesize them!
That's why I care so much about soil living creatures and try to listen less to the advice of agronomists, how to grow raspberries on intensive technology with giant harvests.
Reference by topic: Raspberry repair - planting and care
Three main tricks of growing raspberries
And now I will result some original variants planting raspberries.
For example, instead of trellis, I use a net that encloses a large aviary for poultry. Of course, I planted raspberries on the south side of this building. The benefit of such a solution is threefold: the place is highly rationally used, the view of the aviary is ennobled, and the birds constantly peck all the new shoots - both raspberries and weeds under it. And at the same time they do not allow plants to spread over the grid.
I, for my part, easily normalize the number of plants I need, leaving trellis as wide as 1 m. What's even better in the neighborhood of a raspberry with a poultry house is that there are a lot of litter in the enclosure and a part of the roots extend in that direction, supplying plants with the necessary nitrogen and potassium. And I immediately plant raspberries myself during the summer and autumn mulching with dry grass, litter from animals and chips from small twigs, which are always abundant in the garden after pruning apples and pears.
Thus, I create ideal conditions for the development of soil fungi and soil predators. These are the best defenders of my raspberry from illnesses.
One of the pictures shows how my cats warm themselves in May in a raspberry in an open-air cage on warm earth amid sturdy stems. By the way, last year's branches without shelter have well suffered the winter and gave wonderful shoots. And the other picture shows the same garden after a couple of months. New shoots grew over more than 2 m, and the old ones bent under the weight of the ripening harvest.
Another landing option. On the south side of my brick house, I made a narrow bed: I allocated one half for the earliest yellow-fruited raspberries, and the second for repair. Having departed from the bed 2 m, he made two trellises under the vineyard.
What did you achieve? And here's what: raspberries are protected from the north by a wall of white brick (which also reflects the sun's rays), and from the south by grapes. So, both early and repairing varieties give me abundant sweet berries even in the cold summer, especially since I do not regret mulch from rough organics for planting raspberries.
I have a third option. On the southern side of the apple orchard, I planted a mixture of the most delicious and unpretentious varieties of raspberries, which were selected in the gardens of the familiar gardeners. Planted nests among the plantings of other bushes and allowed the raspberries to fight for a place in the sun, like in a wild forest. Even nettles and other weeds do not weed.
If you bring a lot of branches and other organic materials from the garden to raspberry, then its thick foliage on two-meter branches itself easily suppresses all the weeds.
Some varieties in my garden did not survive, but those who survived grew very quickly. In general, in fact, I was trying to make raspberries slightly run wild. And here the whole charm is that such a "uncivilized" raspberry is very tasty and gives so many berries that they are enough, regardless of the weather. A little care is required. My grandchildren and I take a basket and compete who will quickly find the most productive raspberry bushes and fill their baskets first, and put the largest and most juicy berries in our mouths. And the grandmother will carefully pick the fruits at home: you don’t need to wash them, because they are guaranteed to be clean. In winter, such berries cannot be distinguished from fresh ones from the freezer.
Since I get a lot of varieties, from the second year I strictly follow the growing shoots: I look for symptoms of curly raspberries and a “witch's broom” - this is when a large number of very thin shoots of root shoots are formed. They grow from one small area of the rhizome and reach a height of up to 15 cm. The leaves on them are small. This virus is very dangerous, I immediately dig and burn such bushes.
Reference by topic: Raspberry yellow giant - photo and description
Varieties of raspberries that I recommend
And now I will tell you about several interesting varieties that impressed me
me their own characteristics. I'll start with Joan Gee - it has very large and fragrant berries. Of all the new products, it seems to me that it is the most adapted for the Black Earth. I really like and Himbo Top. His berries are even larger, so this variety requires almost ideal growing conditions. In short, you can call him a capricious and boring, but if you find a common language with him, then the crops will be fantastic.
Alt Gold - the best, in my opinion, yellow fruit variety. Suitable for people with allergies and for children. Like me and Firebird and Atlant. The quality of berries rivals for them is difficult to find (although the fruits do not differ in size).
Now about the traditional varieties of raspberries, bearing fruit in July. I'll start with Meteora. This is a very early variety, but what delicious berries it has! And he gave better results with the "cultural feral" in the apple orchard. Mirage and Beauty of Russia also good, but require better care.
From foreign I will note Glen Apple and its intensive type clones with excellent characteristics: Glen Line, Glen Fine and Glen Magna. By the way, all of them are not rare visitors in nurseries.
Raspberries in my garden - photo
The largest raspberry - which variety?
Advise a grade of a raspberry
This year, raspberries of incredibly large size were sold on the market. In a glass of them was placed only from a dozen, so they were great! I used to hear about such a raspberry, but I thought that all this is a fairy tale, or it grows somewhere in the south. The seller said that this variety is grown with us, in the Nizhny Novgorod region. She even called the grade, but I do not remember it. Dear editor, help me find such a raspberry. I'd like to please both myself and my grandchildren.
HE. Grigoriev, N. Novgorod
Today, raspberry culture is widespread and grown in almost every garden. Despite this, the consumption of fresh raspberry berries per capita is negligible.
Imagine you decide to harvest raspberries for the winter. But to go to the market and buy, say, a bucket of raspberries will not work out simply because of the lack of such an amount.
Raspberries are used in the food industry: they are added to yogurts, baby food, preserves, jams, etc. But the raw materials for this are used either from Europe (mainly Poland), or from China. A reasonable question arises: can not Russian farmers feed the Russians fresh raspberry?
The answer is simple, they would have been able, but to date there have been no nurseries ready to offer decent varieties in sufficient quantity.
Fortunately, the situation is changing. The best large-sized varieties began to appear on sale. Nurseries master the reproduction of these varieties and offer both amateurs and private farmers. In the fall, seedlings of repair varieties are sold with berries, and customers can appreciate their amazing size!
In the Nizhny Novgorod region, the school garden nursery is engaged in the production of raspberry planting material. Moreover, there is even work being done on the selection of remont raspberries, headed by Chairman Shiblev Vladimir Alexandrovich. We started working together with IV Kazakov, who made a huge contribution to the development of remont raspberries as a culture in our country. In parallel, they collaborated with Dzhigadlo M.I., and he pushed for a new method of selection.
As a result, a variety was created remontant raspberries Nizhny Novgorod, characterized by the huge size of berries - up to 15-20 g. The pulp is tender, sweet and sour with aroma. Fresh tasting assessment of berries 3,9 points. When cultivated, the variety is resistant to diseases and pests at the level of standard varieties.
At the beginning of this year, I finished the state registration of a raspberry variety Caramel. This is a variety of red-berry remont raspberries, erect, slightly prickly. Berries from the first harvest to 12 g, the average weight of the berry per season is 6 g, yield up to 5 kg per bush. The taste differs sharply from the existing repair raspberry varieties with a very sweet berry, a tasting score of 4,6 points, which is achieved due to the high sugar content (up to 10%) and a very low acid content - 0,96%. The pulp is juicy, the peduncle separates easily. The berries are dense, dry, transportable.
The first berries in the conditions of the Nizhny Novgorod region ripen in late July - early August (in 2013 - August 1, in 2014 - July 24). Before frost, the variety manages to give 100% of the crop. The variety has a high degree of shoot formation, due to which the yield is growing rapidly. The berries are wonderful both fresh and processed, including after frosts.
It is hard to say what kind of berries the author of the question saw on the market. There are many large-fruited varieties now.
Another question is what seedlings sell. Unfortunately, there are fakes on sale. For repairing and large-fruited varieties, ordinary raspberries are given, because it is almost impossible to distinguish plants from the leaves.
To avoid fakes, buy raspberries at garden shows, in specialized stores, or on the spot, in a nursery. Have a good harvest!
© Author: Gennady Fedorovich Raspopov
Below other entries on the topic "Dacha and garden - with their own hands"
- Raspberry of Russia (photo)
- Aronia raspberry varieties, planting and care in the Moscow region
- Experience of cultivation of patch raspberry in its area
- Raspberry super-harvest - only 5 agricultural practices you need to know
- Raspberry tutimer - expert reviews
- Raspberry Variety Orange Miracle - Care Tips
- Transplanting forest raspberries to the site and growing them in wheels
- Shelter for raspberries and gardener
- Growing remontant raspberries in a greenhouse - my reviews
- Rosolistnaya raspberry - planting and care (photo)
Subscribe to updates in our groups and share.
Let's be friends!
#
If you do not take care of raspberries, you should not expect high yields. From the root of the shoots and thickets of replacement shoots, not only the number of berries, but also their size will decrease with each year.
This story happened to my raspberry. Now I realized that the most important thing to do to preserve and increase the yield is to fight the shoots.
I cut the shoots under the root every fall. Annually in October I thin out raspberry bushes, I remove all old branches, and also weak shoots of replacement. I leave on the bush only 6-7 new shoots and a few old twigs. To raspberries in winter did not freeze, I bend them to the soil with the help of wire arcs.
In the spring before the most buds buds I fertilize raspberries with organic. Under the bush poured into 2 buckets diluted with water (1: 1) Mullein infusion.
#
I want to tell you important information that you need to know about raspberries in order to get good harvests. Terrestrial shoots of ordinary (non-remontant) raspberries live for two years, giving a harvest for the second summer. For fruiting, you need to leave only shoots formed in the spring. Shoots growing in the summer are best removed - they are just like a simple root shoot. Raspberry planting can live for 25 years, but it actively bears fruit much less, 10-12 years. Therefore, it is better to update varieties every decade.
Raspberries fairly well tolerate our frosty winters, but without shelter at -30 ° C may die. Therefore, I bend down to the ground for winter and hide it, and in winter I throw snow on the raspberry.
#
How correctly to plant a raspberry? What kind of soil does she prefer? Is it necessary to trim shoots immediately after planting?
#
Raspberries - one of the most unpretentious shrubs of our gardens. But she also has preferences - she does not tolerate stagnation of water, grows poorly on clay and sandy soils. For raspberries, a site with loamy or sandy loamy soil rich in humus is suitable. Raspberries can be planted in autumn and spring, before the start of the growing season. The distance between the bushes depends on the raspberry varieties - planting plants after 50-80 cm, ordinary plants after 30-50 cm. 40-60 kg of humus, 4-5 g of superphosphate and 30-35 g of potash are added to the planting pits 20 × 25 cm in size. salt. When planting, raspberries should not be deepened (substitution shoots may not appear at all), it is enough to plant to the depth at which the seedling grew earlier. After planting, abundantly water and cut off the aerial part by 30-40 cm to stimulate the growth of new offspring. It is advisable to mulch the soil around the plantings - raspberries have a superficial root system, and it must not be allowed to dry out.