Raspberries

[JaimieSkye]

When is the right time to prune raspberry bushes? How far back should I prune them? We've had a lot of berries since we got the plants about 7 years ago, except for last year. My husband and I are wondering if maybe we're not pruning them right. Should I throw some kind of mulch on them before it snows? Dh and I disagree on this, so I wonder what was right. Mulch before the snow falls, or no?

 

[dhrynio]

I wish I knew! I will be subbing to this thread though and hope for some answers. We are thinking about planting raspberries in the next few years.

 

[Lanie]

We had raspberry bushes in the backyard when I was a little girl. We didn't do anything to them and they pretty much grew wild and we would go pick them when they were perfectly ripe (if the birds didn't get to them first!) Other than that, I have no personal knowledge to share. I found this article, maybe it can help...
http://www.deseretnews.com/article/600119331/Prepare-soil-prune-to-reap-raspberry-rewards.html

 

[JaimieSkye]

We were letting them go for a few years, but then they would get really tall, but have less berries on them, so we started pruning them. When my parents had a cottage upnorth, there were raspberry bushes all over the woods. Of course, they just grew wild and they were fine. Maybe I'm over thinking it and the weather was a factor in how many berries we had.

 

[Isoceles]

Raspberries should be fairly easy to maintain (ie not fragile at all). I prune them unseverely in the spring. But theres different kinds of them. My yellow raspberries are fancier and perhaps not as immune to human stupidity as some others.

 

[nelson castro]

Unpruned raspberry bushes won't yield more berries and can lead to problems and even early die out of the raspberry bushes. Pruning raspberry plants does more than just keep your plants under control. Raspberries can be prone to disease and pruning inhibits the spread of disease throughout your patch.

The best time to prune it is during Late Winter or Early Spring.

 

[JenVarsity]

Raspberries do not necessarily need attention, they are very hardy plants. However, they definitely yield better if you prune them.

After the first yield, you'll want to go through and snip off the branches that do not have brightly green colored leaves or where the stalk looks dark brown. These would have had low to no yield anyway. Next, you would want to go through the new canes and prune off anything that is smaller than like a pencil or pen - these would have small raspberries if they did yield and not worth wasting the nutrients to the rest of the plant. The idea is to thin out the bushes to have large wide canes and lots of space for air circulation (disease control) and sunlight to get to the fruit. This forces the nutrients to those specific canes and forces a higher yield in berries. When they're thouroughly pruned they might look a bit bare to you, but your yields will be much higher on the strong healthy branches the next year.

Then I always go through mine again when the first chill sets in. I pull out all the stalks that allow pulling and trim the ones that bore fruit or look unhealthy to the ground allowing the new shoots to grown and bear fruit the following season.

Best of luck!

 

[headfullofbees]

Are your raspberries primocane, autumn-fruiting, or floricane, summer-fruiting?

 

[JenVarsity]

Summer bearing. I am glad you asked because I should have specified. Summer bearing are pruned after the first yield. Autumn bearing are first purned about now when the freeze starts lifting.

Most raspberries are of a summer-bearing varietiy. During the first year, the new green cane (primocane) grows vegetatively. The cane falls dormant in winter. During the second growing season it's called a floricane. The floricane produces fruit and then dies. New primocanes are produced each year, thus production continues year after year.

Fall bearing crops can be pruned to only yield one crop if the second crop of the year typically gets lost or damaged to early freezes.