Advice - Growing Fruit Shrubs - Raspberry, Blueberry, Blackcurrant

[Dynamite]

Hello, I am after some advice from some members that have more experience than me. I have purchased my £1 each fruit bushes from Poundland (see my post http://www.growfruitandveg.co.uk/gra...1-a_92718.html)

I have.....

1. Blueberry - 'Patriot'
2. Raspberry - 'Malling Promise'
3. Blackcurrant - 'Ojebyn'

It would be great if somebody could give me advice on the best soil and growing tips to make it a fruitful harvest.

Image pasted below.

Kind Regards............Rob

[veggiechicken]

There's some good advice in the GYO Growing Guides at the top of the page and there is information on most fruit and veg. How To Grow Vegetables & Fruit | Growing Guides & Tips | Grow Your Own Magazine
Have a look at those to start you off

[Dynamite]

There's some good advice in the GYO Growing Guides at the top of the page and there is information on most fruit and veg. How To Grow Vegetables & Fruit | Growing Guides & Tips | Grow Your Own Magazine
Have a look at those to start you off

Many thanks

[Dynamite]

Many thanks

Much appreciated. Like many guides and "generic" instruction such as "in full sun" or " grow in moisture tetentive well drained soil" it is obviously just rhetoric that is put on pretty much every plant I ever buy.

What I am after as an amateur is rather than telling me "moisture retentive soil", tell me exactly what the soil should be made up of. To me....compost, manure, top soil, etc etc.........in layman terms to an amateur. I realise this is a forum and not a traing course so apologies.

Kind Regards...............lRob

[fishpond]

What is your soil like:-
Is it stoney, chalk, clay, silt ,loam, water logged, free draining. Is it acid, alkaline, neutral?
When we know that, you can be advised on what to do to adjust it.
Where do you get the sun in your garden---if you get any sun?
Are you intending to plant these in the ground or in pots?

[veggiechicken]

Rob, I think you're worrying too much. Fruit bushes are pretty hardy and will cope with most conditions. The ones you've bought will be quite small and may be better in a large pot while they establish themselves.
Apart from blueberries that like slightly acidic soil, the others will grow in any normal garden soil.

[BUFFS]

as said ,except for the likes of blueberries, plants given reasonable soil, light and water will thrive, and I found that the more you fuss with them the weaker they seem to be, I set up the pots or soil for them, a bit of BFB, in they go, a good watering, and that's it for at least a month at this time of year round here, its april before we get any good weather so I never have to worry about them drying out, drowning maybe but not drying. I did some dwarf fruit trees in December and put them under cover, they are starting to bloom but its still months before I will be getting the hose out, they are in 50ltr tubs of john innes No3 so about mid april will be early enough. I have done this to peaches and apricots and they are going to give bumper crops as the apricots are already set, and the peaches not far behind. in the ground we have rasps, goosegogs, honeyberry, blackcurrants, all treated the same and all producing enough to fill a 6ft freezer. when you put them into soil/ pots , trim them back to promote bushy growth and shove the offcut threequarters depth into the soil beside them, I started out with one poundland blackcurrant bush and by doing this I now have over 20, works with the goosegogs too, don't be too fussy, plants will live given the basics, just let them get on with it and reap the benefits..

[Zelenina]

If you're planting them in containers, the raspberry and blackcurrant will do fine in multi-purpose potting compost.

The blueberry needs compost suitable for acid loving plants e.g. rhododendrons and azaleas and some heathers. It's often called ericaceous compost. It also won't like being watered with tap water unless it's soft. If you're in a hard water area it's best to collect rain water to water it with.

Or you can just dig holes in the ground and plant the raspberry and blackcurrant, but not the blueberry unless your soil is acid. Raspberries grow like weeds in my garden without any special attention or soil mixtures.

[Kirk]

Blueberry in a big pot with ericacious compost - it NEEDS to be acidic and water with rain water not tap water. Believe me a watering with the stuff from the tap usually means death.

The other two are fine and will grow in just about anything reasonable. As long as it is not drought conditions. Raspberries are a woodland plant and so really will not like getting into desert or mediterrean conditions of soil. Catch being they tend to have shallow roots. Mine is in garden soil with about 20% to 25% of compost dug in. The compost makes it a bit lighter as when summer it would set solid.

Have an idea blackcurrents need to go a bit deeper then expected, sort of bury the branches a bit - slight problem is i'm not sure why I say that.

[Jay-ell]

Black currants are burried deeper than when they were in a pot to encourage new stems to grow from the stool underground rather than branching out above th soil. Old stems get cut back to the soil rather than to one or two buds to encourage continued development of new stems from underground.

I had a few Aldi Black currant bushes in morrisons flower buckets which didn't do anything except hang in there. I popped them into a bed last year late spring/early summer and they took off. They are nice big now and even without leaves or flowers smell wonderfully of black currant. They are covered with buds and I should get a nice harvest this year.

Raspberries have advantageous roots which means that as the root spreads out they will send up new stems along their length rather than just from the base of the new plants. Once theyre growing out of where you want them you need to pull te canes up not just cut them back. I had 2 Tulameen raspberries planted last spring which gave some summer fruit. They also sent up half a dozen canes in spring which gave quite a bit of autumn fruit. In late summer they sent up about 20 new canes which will hopefully give me lots of summer fruit this year and currently have a load of new canes poking out the ground which I'll see if I get the two timing harvest again this year - those 2 little canes now cover most of an 8x4 foot bed in just 1 year.

I also planted 6 cell grown Joan J later on in the year which are Autumn Raspberries. They too have a number of new canes poking up from around the soil and should have the bed covered later on in the year.

It seems that 'Malling Promise' is a summer raspberry. These usually send their canes up later in the year which will flower the following year - so when you prune the raspberries make sure you are cutting the older canes out (i.e. the ones which have flowered) and leave the younger canes to give you a crop next summer. You never know - yours might be as confused as mine are and you could get 2 crops a year.

These fruit beds had a lot of organic matter in them - loads of well composted manure and compost in the soil and added as a mulch later in the year.

I have a blueberry and a pink blueberry in MFBs which are doing well at the moment but will need moving up into more space - I'm tempted to make an acidic bed for them and cranberry bushes by digging in sulphur and using ericaceous (acidic) compost to plant them in until the sulphur kicks in.

Be warned though - fruit growing can become addictive. I’ve got raspberries, blackberries, black currants, red currants, golden currants, blue berries, pink blueberries, cranberries, honeyberries, strawberries, apples, pears, plums, cherry, gooseberries, goji berry, pomegranate, Himalayan Honeysuckle, grapes, fig trees and kiwi. Not to mention the bananas, lemon, lime or orange.