Transplanting Blackberry Bushes

We have several thickets of blackberry bushes around the property and get enough blackberries for me to make wine and my wife to make pies and jelly. Picking them in this wild, inter-twined state is a bit of a chore as anyone who's picked blackberries knows. Plus a couple of thickets are way out back, quite a walk from the home.

I have a lot of room near the main garden so I plan to transplant some blackberry plants into nice rows with room to walk between them, making the bushes accessible from either side. Sort of like the vineyard. I'll leave most of the wild thickets as they are so that we can continue to get berries until the "tamed" blackberries start to bear fruit.

I've read that they like acid soil and several websites recommended pruning them to a short cane and transplanting at this time of year (late summer here in Maryland) so that they'll start growing new canes during the fall.

Has anyone had experience with transplanting blackberries or setting up a tame berry patch? Anything I should be sure to do or not to do?

Paul

Reply to
Pavel314
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We "espalier" our blackberries on wire and get a very nice crop. We throw a net over them when they start to ripen but we do share a few with the birds. Ours are the thornless type and they do not run. We did a similar thing where we used to live and they kept coming up all over the lawn, so we changed cultivars. I posted 5 different pics of our blackberries (first year) so you can get an idea how we did them.. tamely:

Our soil is improved lousy clay, but not acid. Blackberries don't seem to mind wet feet as much as the raspberries which we had to move. They transplanted well. My husband is thinking of putting in another row of "fence" for the berries when he gets some time. I trim out some of the older canes each year. They are far more filled in than they were in

2002, needless to say but these were the only pics I had readily available. These were taken in the fall, probably late September or Early October. Our first year garden in our present location.

Isabella

Reply to
Isabella Woodhouse

Very nice berry patch; thanks for posting the pictures.

Paul

Reply to
Pavel314

Oh you're quite welcome. :) Hope that helped a little.

Isabella

Reply to
Isabella Woodhouse

Pardon me Isabella, I was admiring your photos and wondering where you live.

Thx

Reply to
Patrick

I'm glad you liked them. :) We live right smack dab in the middle of the US right outside St. Louis.

Isabella

Reply to
Isabella Woodhouse

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