No sign of life yet.

[noviceveggrower]

Hi, On my plot I have currant bushes, 3 gooseberry bushes, a blackberry and raspberry canes.
The currant bushes and gooseberry bushes are popping into life quite well but no real signs of life from the raspberries or blackberry don't seem to be showing anything yet.
Last year when I got the plot the fruit section was a mess with nothing been cut down at all for a couple of seasons. So after everything had finished fruiting I cut it back like you should. The only way for me to pick last year was to put a thick coat on and squeeze between things.
The raspberries are a mixture of summer and autumn. The blackberry is a mystery except that it had the biggest thorns I have ever seen on a blackberry. Fruit was very, very nice though
So are they just taking their time or is something wrong?
Thanks

[fishpond]

Is it possible that they have been waterlogged through the winter?

[veggiechicken]

My summer fruiting rasps are in leaf on last year's canes, the autumn ones are sending up new shoots at the base but they're only an inch or so long.
Did you prune all your rasps down to ground level?

[rustylady]

Last year when I got the plot the fruit section was a mess with nothing been cut down at all for a couple of seasons. So after everything had finished fruiting I cut it back like you should.

Thanks

How far back did you cut them? And have you cut all the canes down to the ground?

[noviceveggrower]

The area that the raspberries are in did get very wet with some pools of water. Cut all the canes to about a foot to foot and half.
Oh no have I killed them?

[veggiechicken]

Summer raspberries fruit on last year's canes - so by cutting them down you've stopped them fruiting this year. The Autumn ones should throw up new canes to crop this year.

[WendyC]

Try scratching the canes to reveal the layer just under the bark. Green=alive! brown=dead.

[fishpond]

The area that the raspberries are in did get very wet with some pools of water. Cut all the canes to about a foot to foot and half.
Oh no have I killed them?

It is possible that the amount of rain has killed them, really depends on the type of soil you have--time will tell.
If you check out surrounding allotments it should be possible to see what stage yours should be at.
Even ask some of the other allotent holders for their verdict on yours.--you may even get offered some new plants

[noviceveggrower]

Summer raspberries fruit on last year's canes - so by cutting them down you've stopped them fruiting this year. The Autumn ones should throw up new canes to crop this year.

Oh s*d. Will just have to wait and see what springs into life I think.

[noviceveggrower]

It is possible that the amount of rain has killed them, really depends on the type of soil you have--time will tell.
If you check out surrounding allotments it should be possible to see what stage yours should be at.
Even ask some of the other allotent holders for their verdict on yours.--you may even get offered some new plants

Think I am the only one with fruit down in the bottom section of the allotment site. Think I will have to do what WendyC recommends.

[veggiechicken]

Oh s*d. Will just have to wait and see what springs into life I think.

You may be pleasantly surprised
My summer and autumns are jumbled up together so I adopt the "if its dead cut it out" pruning technique. Try it next year

[cptncrackoff]

Hopefully they will turn up at some point...
I bought some canes from a cheap website in autumn 2012, planted them out following the instructions to the letter..then waited...and waited....
Fast forward to the beginning of Autumn 2013..no sign of anything..had a furtle, all canes were totally dry, no root growth, all totally dead. bit of a mystery really!

October 2013 bought some more canes from the RHS website, on offer and not too expensive, planted these, same ground, same treatment but these have green shoots all over the remaining few inches of cane and more importantly all have suckers coming up 5-6 inches away from the canes!!

I don't know for definite why the first lot failed, dodgy weather, dodgy storage.. I'll never know!!

If yours don't show up..don't give up!!

[Veggielot]

Both my summer and autumn raspberries are in leaf. This is my first winter with raspberries so don't how typical this is.

[AllInContainers]

Here the raspberries, the oldest blueberry and the three pink lemonade are in leaf, as is the medlar and the elder, blackcurrant and filbert are just starting to leaf up too.

The other three blueberries are less active, the cherry is heavily budded (but still no #£$^&*@ blossom for the third year not happy!!!), and the jostaberry and persimmon are in bud too.

The blue sausage fruit was just starting to open it's buds, but is now wrapped in fleece to protect from the frosts, and the fig is still wrapped up in all it's winter woolies

[Bren In Pots]

I planted my freecycled autumn biss raspberry canes mid Feb and they've got 1 inch long shoots they were a mix of old and new canes.