raspberry bush or canes?! Help!

[jenjen23]

Hi,

I just bought some raspberries (autumn fruiting) from a local nursery assuming they were a bundle of bare root canes in pots, but I've just got them home and it says 'fruit bush' on the label, have I made a stupid mistake and ended up with container grown plants? There are 5 canes in each pot, and cost £6.35 for each pot, so I thought I was getting a pretty good deal. Is there any way to tell without uprooting them? Will ring the nursery in the morning to confirm, but I'm feeling rather stupid, I should have checked with them properly, but I've only seen canes for sale everywhere else! Is there an advantage to having pot grown instead of bare root?

[Martin H]

I would knock them out of the pot and see if I can tease them apart. I suspect that they at least started as five canes even if they have now grown together. So it should be possible to pull them apart and plant them separately. Make sure each piece has a live shoot on it.

Raspberries are pretty tough.

[Thelma Sanders]

I agree, give them a good soak to soften the compost, so you can tease them apart to separate them.

There will be more than one plant in there.

[jenjen23]

Thanks, I'll do that then, just didn't want to disturb them if I decided to try and return them to the nursery! Sounds like they should still be useful to me so I'll keep hold of them

[Bigmallly]

Forgive me, I'm a little confused. If I was to lift one of my JoanJ autumn rasps and put it in a pot, it would have about 5 canes so in effect is a bush. I'm sure with a little patience they could be teased apart.

[spamvindaloo]

Forgive me, I'm a little confused. If I was to lift one of my JoanJ autumn rasps and put it in a pot, it would have about 5 canes so in effect is a bush. I'm sure with a little patience they could be teased apart.

I don't think it's one plant. I've bought them like that from a GC before and apart from a little root tangle, they're separate and just being kept together in the same pot.

I'd get them out of the pot and gently separated and planted whilst they're still relatively dormant.

[Bigmallly]

I've recently transplanted some JoanJ's and they had multiple canes from a single rootball.

[muddled]

My neighbour on a previous allotment grew his raspberries as bushes.

they were wonderful! Needed no stakes or wires and cropped incredibly well. They were simply cut back each winter, they grew to about chest high, laden with fruit and easy to pick.
He was going a bit peculiar by the time I got my plot, poor man, and couldn't/wouldn't speak to me so I never found out if they were 'special' varieties or ordinary canes grown differently.
Some were yellow, some pink and some definitely very red.

(the odd one that I pinched as I walked past tasted divine )

[jenjen23]

Thanks for the replies everyone. I'm confused too Bigmally! My thinking is that they are perhaps multiple canes from one rootball, but I haven't looked yet. I'm going to ring the nursery first as I think I'll return them if they are single plants. I need 10 and so need individual canes as these were £6.35 each so would work out rather expensive! Muddled, they are just Autumn Bliss and Polka, but presumably this nursery has decided to go down the container grown route instead of bare root for some reason, but they didn't make it that clear!

[jenjen23]

Forgive me, I'm a little confused. If I was to lift one of my JoanJ autumn rasps and put it in a pot, it would have about 5 canes so in effect is a bush. I'm sure with a little patience they could be teased apart.

With your transplanted Joan Js, do you think it would have been possible to separate them if they are from a single rootball? Don't want to kill the lot!

[Thelma Sanders]

My neighbour on a previous allotment grew his raspberries as bushes.

they were wonderful! Needed no stakes or wires and cropped incredibly well. They were simply cut back each winter, they grew to about chest high, laden with fruit and easy to pick.

This perfectly describes Autumn raspberries, so easy compared to Summer fruiting varieties

[Bigmallly]

With your transplanted Joan Js, do you think it would have been possible to separate them if they are from a single rootball? Don't want to kill the lot!

They are quite hardy plants & am sure as long as each cane has some root, you should be able to separate them.

[jenjen23]

Ok thanks Bigmally, I'll see how it goes!

I'm thinking I will keep them any way and maybe get some more bare root ones if I can't separate them. Is there an advantage to using container grown as opposed to bare root? Better crop in the first year/establish better?

[Bigmallly]

The only advantage I can think of when growing in containers is that suckers won't be sprouting up everywhere...............but they can be grown in pots or the ground.

How To Grow Raspberries | Thompson & Morgan

[Kirk]

I suspect the term "bush" is nothing more then one way of describing them.
People here buy blackberry canes but there are often called a blackberry bush, I bet you have pick fruit along the hedge rows off a balckberry bush, but they are also canes.

Likely the term "bush" is applied to those that clump a bit so that you get one clump of canes like a multi-stemmed bush. Blackberry's do tend clump however and likely more then a raspberry does.

Just tease the canes apart and plant, they will then happily either spread and you will get canes appearing all over the place or new canes will appear close to the original planting location.