Propogating berries

Jens the Beekeeper
Jens the Beekeeper Posts: 651 admin
edited September 2018 in Our Garden: Growing Food

Comments

  • ines871
    ines871 Posts: 1,283 ✭✭✭✭✭

    The title is "propagating berries" but no posts ? Was it deleted? Was there suggestions, or a question?

    Here are growing Blackberries, Blueberries, Currants, Gooseberries, Raspberries, Strawberries, Gojiberries, etc. Half are still babies. And we plan to add more.

  • Jens the Beekeeper
    Jens the Beekeeper Posts: 651 admin

    Seems that the original content got lost during the recent forum update/reshape.


    I asked for the methods everyone uses to propagate their berries.

    For black currants I am very successfull with just popping the cuts into the soil and let them root on their own.

    Blueberries I have no experience with and would liek to try a tested method to expand my stock of currently 4 varieties with one plant each to something more substantial.

  • Merin Porter
    Merin Porter Posts: 1,026 admin

    With my raspberries, I just dig about 6 inches around the extra cane while they're still dormant, prune down to about the second node, transplant, and water well. Just did this about a month ago and they've already leafed out and are looking happy....

  • Wnon
    Wnon Posts: 7

    Strawberries put out daughter plants and those root easily. I use rooting hormone for blueberries, saskatoons and haskap. Take new growth for the cuttings, dip in hormone and stick in soil. Keep moist.

    Also, do try making your own rooting hormone...chop up willow branches, the ones that are new growth, and cover in water. I let mine sit for a couple of days and use it to water any vine cuttings (like grapes). Also works for some flowering shrubs I propagate for the landscaping industry here in Manitoba.

  • Jens the Beekeeper
    Jens the Beekeeper Posts: 651 admin

    An Sex forgot shout und strawberries. I use für same approach vor the as you Wendy. Need yet to try für willow water. Current J habe willow cuttings growing😉

  • DebiB
    DebiB Posts: 92 ✭✭✭

    Blackberries are also easy to propagate. Wherever a blackberry cane touches the ground in my garden, it roots and starts a new plant (unless I catch it early enough). If you wanted to propagate blackberries just allow the canes to establish roots where it touches the ground and then cut it from the mother plant and replant it where you want it.

  • JOBallinger
    JOBallinger Posts: 15 ✭✭✭

    I want to learn to propagate blueberries as well. Anyone?

  • ines871
    ines871 Posts: 1,283 ✭✭✭✭✭

    Hi @JOBallinger - Blueberry plants can live to 50 years, & are generally easy to grow. --- Unless grown grouped together for some heat, they don't like Frost like on an isolated hill. But if you plant them too close to a building they could bloom too early. Not shaded by trees, Full sun is best. They love acidic soil with a pH between 4.5 & 5.5. Just remember they have a shallow Root-system, so you learn the balance... between not letting them stand in water or else the roots rot, And keeping them well-watered.- It's important to choose plants Well-suited to your area of the world. This Guide can get you started


  • Ray
    Ray Posts: 11 ✭✭✭

    I have much better luck with strawberry runners rooting to become new plants if I leave them attached to the 'mother' until the new ones have established roots. I have tried it without the 'mother' but with only a 10-15% success rate.

  • chimboodle04
    chimboodle04 Posts: 286 ✭✭✭

    Black Raspberries are easy too - they root where ever a cane touches the soil, so we bend our new years' growth and bury the top few inches of a cane in a pot filled with soil. When you start to see evidence of new growth from the pot, you can clip off the cane you used to propagate it somewhere in its middle, leaving half on the old plant and some on the new plant as well. Plant out propagated plants as the weather allows.

  • april.chase
    april.chase Posts: 10 ✭✭✭

    I have had good luck with goji berries just cutting off a branch with new growth and sticking it in the ground, then keeping it moist until it takes off. They also root wherever a branch touches the ground so you can get new plants that way too.

  • Ronda Jones
    Ronda Jones Posts: 3

    Elderberries are very easy to propagate. Take cuttings of new wood in the late winter or woody cuttings in the late fall. Remove all but the top two or three leaves. I scratch the “bark” at the base of the cutting just to where you can see the green cambium layer and put them in moist soil, cover with a plastic bag and wait.. roots will grow from the “wound.” I have seen success with hard wood cutting just poked in the ground, but have no personal experience with that method.

  • Obiora E
    Obiora E Posts: 517 ✭✭✭✭

    @Ronda Jones I have experience taking hardwood cuttings of Elderberries and putting directly into the ground during the Winter and they will start to form leaves as they form roots in the early to mid Spring. They will try to flower that first year so pinch off any potential flowers to help them produce strong roots.

    You can also take cuttings below a node of black raspberries, wild blackberries (not sure about the domesticated varieties) as you would Elderberries as hardwood cuttings and put into the ground and they will form roots and leaf out after (or during) root development.

    I have read the same is true for grapes but you will need to have longer stems to root (see the article from Mike McGroarty):