Cultivated brambles
When
I was a kid, we never cultivated brambles (blackberries and
raspberries.) Instead, we knew spots where big patches grew wild,
and we'd go on a pilgrimage to pick by the side of a country
road. With such good wild berry patches, why grow your own?
Lately, I've decided
that cultivated brambles do have definite
advantages. The large cultivated berries are quick and easy to
pick, and in many cases taste as good or better than the wild
berries. You can grow thornless varieties (particularly of
blackberries) to cut down on the scratch factor and everbearing
varieties (particularly of red raspberries) that extend the bramble
season from early summer through the killing frost. If you find
varieties well suited to your soil and climate, you can also expect
much higher production out of cultivated brambles than out of wild
canes.
Although cultivated blackberries
and raspberries can be pricey, the frugal homesteader quickly learns
that she only needs to buy one plant of each variety. If the
brambles like your garden, they'll grow so fast that you'll be overrun
with offshoots to give away by the end of the second year. (But
do be prepared to
run through a few varieties before you find one well
suited to your garden.)
The only real
disadvantage I've found with cultivated brambles is that they take up a
good deal of space. On the other hand, they tend to grow well in
awful soil that wouldn't support anything else, and if you prune them
ruthlessly (and mow up any shoots that wander out of their row), you
can definitely keep brambles under control. Our patch of
blackberries and raspberries is the easiest and most productive part of
our fruit garden so far.
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About us: Anna Hess and Mark Hamilton spent over a decade living self-sufficiently in the mountains of Virginia before moving north to start over from scratch in the foothills of Ohio. They've experimented with permaculture, no-till gardening, trailersteading, home-based microbusinesses and much more, writing about their adventures in both blogs and books.
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I subscribe to lawnmower-based pruning, but so far nothing else. My blackberry bush started out heavily pruned, and was producing perhaps a quart or two a year. After several years of mostly unrestrained growth, I estimate I will get 6 gallons from it this summer.
There's something great about a blackberry bush deep enough that berries can hide in the recesses inside it. Those berries turn out largest and sweetest.
Hmm, gathering and eating (ok, gorging) wild brambles is one of my fondest childhood memories.
Last summer I found quite a large patch next to the canal close to work. Yum!