Anyone growing blackberries or raspberries?

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golgotha, Jan 7, 12:33pm
That's great that you got some raspberries, I didn't get any raspberries this season.

harrislucinda, Jan 7, 1:40pm
have a wee patch of raspberries made 3 jars of fresh jam off mine this season

pross1, Jan 8, 1:26pm
I bought the Incredible edibles mini me raspberry 2 years ago .I am so disappointed with it. Last season was no fruit and this season the fruit is forming but before it gets ripe they just go brown and die.

golgotha, Jan 23, 1:45pm
I'm disappointed as well,
My mini me raspberry plant (bought 2 years ago as well) fruited last season but not this season.

golgotha, Jan 23, 1:54pm
The Blackberry, Raspberry and Boysenberry plants have now been replaced by thorny & spiny varieties, I've got a Karaka Blackberry, Mapua Boysenberry, Brulee Boysenberry and Aspiring Raspberry.

My Black Raspberry has fruited and it tastes decent but lots of hard seeds, I'm pretty happy with it though as I wasn't expecting it to do much this season.

nzshooter01, Jan 23, 3:31pm
Ive. Just planted 2 thornless blackberries in chch
I await the results

megan109, Jan 23, 6:30pm
Lots of blackberries growing in the wild and along the road side if you want to pick them

nzshooter01, Jan 23, 8:21pm
I live in the country cant say ive seen any around here

megan109, Jan 23, 9:00pm
nzshooter01 wrote:

I live in the country cant say ive seen any around here[/quote Keep looking as they are out there. Got a whole lot down by my gate but I live in the big city!

nzshooter01, Jan 23, 10:03pm
I think id prefer to walk out the back and pick my own, from the label on the plants they should be the greatest eating black berriez on the planet, we shall see

alston, Jan 24, 8:57am
just be careful, they may have been sprayed.

jan2242, Jan 24, 9:54am
Yes, and they are doing great. Have them each in a half 44 gallon drums. The blackberry has a plant support in it as it's grown so much.

catiez, Jan 24, 4:34pm
I'm growing Mini Me raspberries and i have found them to be the best tasting raspberries I've tasted and the fruit are a good size on a low bushy shrub .

golgotha, Jan 30, 1:04pm
I can now rate them in order of preference

(1) Raspberries (Mini Me), these are the most delicious, every berry ripened quickly and was perfectly formed. I like this plant so much I propagated another 4 plants from the root stems which are all doing nicely

(2) Blueberries (Tifblue/Powerblue) very fast growing and with nice tasting berries, I deliberately cut off most buds so the roots would grow stronger so there was not many berries.

(3) Blackberries (Black Satin) An extremely fast growing plant with more berries than I expected, it was only a twig at the start of spring, now it's big, The berries are a bit on the sour side yet they do taste quite nice, they may have to be soft and slightly over-ripe to taste sweet

(4) Boysenberries (Purple Star) The largest bramble yet had the smallest amount of fruit, only about 8 berries, I'll give it until next year.

ralta, Jan 30, 2:15pm
Yum. I've had mixed luck growing berries. I have one raised garden bed that has 2 different raspberry plants I put in a few years ago that has spread nicely. I have the beginnings of blackberry growing down the back that just turned up. I have planted a few blueberry plants over the years. Only one has fruited consistently and not died but 2 others are slowly picking up.

My raspberries are suffering, in part from the heat (looking a bit rusty or something) and also from nasty shield type bugs and the heinous fluffy-bum/passion-vine hoppers. I can't spray (not that it ever does much against passion-vine hoppers anyway) as elsewhere in multiple parts of the garden, in ground & in pots we have swan plants and monarchs and I don't want the spray to drift to them.

lythande1, Jan 30, 3:06pm
Blackberries are a weed. For that matter so a re raspberries but they hate Auckland. They really do better in a place that has at least frost in winter. Too humid up there really.
You can, but they struggle.
In pots? I doubt it although at least they won't spread like wildfire, which they will if you let them loose.

I grow raspberries in a small patch down back, it is completely surrounded by a lot of concrete so they can't easily get out.

samanya, Jan 30, 3:37pm
Well done you!
I'm pleased that you are able to taste the fruits of your labours . nothing like a sun warmed berry, huh?

golgotha, Jan 30, 3:38pm
The NZ company 'Incredible Edibles' has some raspberry breeds that are bred to do well in hotter parts of NZ like Auckland, I took a gamble when I bought their 'Mini Me' raspberry & I've been very happy with it, it's actually very convenient because being a smaller dwarf variety, it doesn't mind containers and is easy to manage, I've been growing one in a 20 litre container.

golgotha, Jan 30, 3:42pm
yeah those passion vine hoppers are annoying, someone here said that spraying plain water on the underside of the leaves everyday will keep them at bay, I think it might be cause it washes the eggs & nymphs off the leaves

golgotha, Jan 30, 3:44pm
It's definitely great to eat sun warmed berries. The parrot is still to be convinced though, she's more into supermarket cherries and grapes.

ralta, Jan 30, 6:39pm
Perhaps but it is so muggy here at the moment that I try to water the ground rather than the leaves as I worry about fungal problems.

mark_g, Jan 31, 7:26pm
True that!
I've got a bit of powdery mildew showing up on kamo kamo and cucumber and I don't normally see that until end of Feb or March.

jan2242, Feb 2, 9:37am
Growing both thornless blackberry and raspberry here (North of Auckland). Planted last year and fruited last year. The blackberry has brown so much it is now trained up a obelisk type thing. Each was planted in a 1/2 44gallon drum tat was rusting out int he bottom which makes great drainage holes and keeps the plant tidy.

golgotha, Feb 3, 12:55pm
I'm not very happy with my 'black Satin' blackberry, the berries have been very sour and bitter, I'll be replacing it with another bramble - I'm looking at getting a black raspberry, I've read that they are very healthy.

http://www.traditional-foods.com/antioxidants/black-raspberries/ https://deckerfarm.com/antioxidants.html

samanya, Feb 3, 6:35pm
I have a few black raspberry plants & they are not (imo) prolific & the taste is not quite as good as the more conventional varieties.
That of course could be because I don't have enough water to get to them when they need it & dear old 'Hughey' hasn't been sending it down from the sky for months.