Monday, July 5, 2010

The Best Thing About Late June & Early July

At the peak of the season, I go out back twice a day and gather about a quart of raspberries.



My canes are fourth-generation descendants of the ones my grandfather had in his backyard in Salem, Oregon, where I would gorge myself off them during summer visits as a child. They are hardy and bear like mad, and I would be happy to get starts going for any of you Beaver Staters. (And no, they are not as aggressive as all that. People always say they are, but it's blackberries that you have to worry about.)

6 comments:

Kate said...

Do they need full sun?

Jennifer said...

Sounds like geographic prejudice to me!

Elaine said...

OMG. I am so, so jealous. I still badly miss our acres of blackberries in NE Ohio. My approach --since they bear on two-year-old canes--was to harvest hugely, then in winter mow all of the canes down. The next year would be 'growing year,' and we'd have to make do with the frozen harvest. This meant i only got ripped to shreds on alternate years, happily.
@Kate-- I don't know about M5000's variety, but wild BLACK raspberries do well in filtered sunlight.

fingerstothebone said...

I will take a start next year! I have just the place for it, but I'll need to prep it still. So next year...

Aviatrix said...

Do you think it's legal to import them? I didn't know how you started raspberries growing, but I love raspberries.

gl. said...

i'm so envious: my raspberries, after bearing faithfully and prodigiously for 7 or 8 years, came in really wonky this year. got about a quart total. hope next year is better!