Getting More out of Your Raspberries
We are finally getting spring temperatures, but it is hard to believe we’ll ever see our gardens again with so much snow still on the ground. However, if you are looking to get more out of your raspberries the best time to manage them is soon after they melt out and are almost ready to bud.
Over time, raspberry patches become crowded. When this happens, their fruit production goes down. You can help your raspberries to produce more by removing some of the older canes. If you do this before the plants start putting out leaves, you avoid wasting the energy the plants put into making leaves on canes that are going to be discarded. With our spring and summer schedules being what they are it’s not the end of the world if you miss this “deadline.” Your efforts will still be rewarded, but not till next year.
How can you tell which are the older canes? The newer canes will often be straight, with very few branches. The older canes will often be deeply forked and branched. Older canes are more brittle, while newer canes will be lighter in color and more supple. If everything seems brittle to you, let another week go by and then see whether there is a change.
It is easy to remove the old canes. Just clip them as close to the ground as you can. Burn them so that you don’t accidentally create new raspberry patches where you don’t want them. If it looks like a dense amount of new growth is coming up later in summer, thin the new shoots so you don’t end up with a newly crowded patch.
After pruning, give the remaining canes some gentle support. This will also help to increase your production. Loosely tying the branches to one or two lines that run near the top of your patch like clotheslines is all you need. There are many, many ideas online for supports you can fabricate- a quick search can help you find a design that will work best for your site and hopefully utilize materials you already have on hand.
By Allison Sayer
You might also like:
