This post, Growing Blackberry Vines and Stringing Them Up to Triumph, is a summer update to a post I did back in the fall about stringing up my blackberries for better production.
Growing Blackberry Vines and Stringing Them Up to Triumph
The thorny blackberry bush is not tied up. It looks rather untidy, but it is producing blackberries none the less. The real producer though, are the thornless blackberries that I strung up last fall. None of the blackberries are ripe yet, but there are a lot of them on the canes and quite a few that are still flowering.
String Them Up
The reason I strung the blackberries up are many. First, it allows the bushes to get more sunshine, because they are growing vertically instead of horizontally. It also allows me to go in between the plants without stepping on and breaking the canes. It also allows me to weed better in the area allowing the fruit and canes to get even more sunshine.
In the video I mention issues with planting blackberries and raspberries too close together. The issue with this is that they are in the same family and because of this if one plant catches a disease, the other plant will catch it as well. Most recommendations online are to space different varieties of raspberry and blackberry plants at least 600 feet apart. Mine are only a hundred feet apart and I have not had any issues.
Mulch, Mulch, Mulch
I have had blackberries growing in this spot for about six years now. They never really did that well until two years ago when I took all of the oak leave that fell in the yard and just laid them around the base of the blackberry canes. Ever since I did that, they have taken off. This year I added a couple inches of wood chips on top of the leaves.
All of this mulch helps keep the weed pressure down and it helps keep the roots of the plants cool and moist. It also brings a lot of worms in and helps improve the quality of the soil.
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