Caring for Cape gooseberry?

[Snadger]

Last year I was impressed by a fellow allotmenteers cape gooseberry, grown in a plastic dustbin, about 8 foot tall and laden with fruit!
After trying sowing some shop bought seed (with no success!), he kindly gave me three well rooted cuttings from his parent plant!

They are growing well and I intend growing one in a very large pot in the greenhouse, one in a pot outdoors, and I'm not sure what I'm doing with the other one yet!
They seem to grow similar to a tomato with sideshoots forming at the leaf axils. Is it worth trying to grow one of the plants similarily to a tomato, ie nipping out the side shoots and growing as a single stem, or do I just leave them to there own devices and stake accordingly?

[xspye]

I just leave mine to it Snager, they fruit off all the stems so you may end up reducing the fruiting although you may increase it as there is less effort put into producing MASSES of green foliage. If you have a plant spare why not try it, I'd be really interested in the results especially considering how much space they take up in my poly tunnel!!! And if it doesn't work you can let the plant do what it wants next year, providing it survives the winter, I only lost 1 plant last year so now have 7 starting to flower. Really not sure where I'm going to put them all

[SimonCole]

I leave them to it also Snadger. I have had some probs with rain bending over the leaves and breaking the stems, so would be interested to know whether more upright growth solves or adds to this dilemma.

[Snadger]

Potted the biggest one on today into its final living quarters..a half size water butt!
After putting holes in the bottom I used ordinary garden soil with no additives as I have read that any feed at all encourages leaf growth at the expense of berries. This is the strongest plant and I intend leaving this one to it's own devices in the corner of the greenhouse! One down, two to go!

[Caithness Gardener]

Just how quickly do these things grow?

I have always wanted one so I bought five on e-bay. Similar to tomato I thought - show me a 8 foot tomato! How much do they spread out ? I have a 14' x 24' polytunnel but there are other occupants!

[pigletwillie]

They can get very wide, 3-4' round unless well staked and tied in. I have three down one side of an 8' greenhouse and its a wall of foliage by mid summer.