Good size for berry beds?

[GayRioGrower]

I want to grow raspberries, blackberries, blueberries, and grapes, and just wanted to know what an ideal bed size would be. I want to have a raised bed for each, and also have a variety of each so I can maximize my harvest. So I guess I need to know how wide and long my beds should be? I was thinking about doing them about two foot wide by twelve or fourteen foot long, but didn't know If I was overdoing it or if I was robbing them of growing space? I know it will take atleast a year before I start to enjoy any fruit, but wanted to get it all planned out before I take this venture. Thanks all.

[DoubleDogFarm]

gayriogrower,

I guess it depends on how many mouths you are feeding. My beds are about 4ft x 20ft. I have heritage raspberries, marrionberries, triple crown thornless, and several blue berries. I will be selling extra fruit at the Farmers Market. 3ft x 12 sounds like a good place to start.

Everbearing varieties will give you fruit the year planted.

[hendi_alex]

I like to use a separate bed for each of those kinds of fruiting plants. I constructed my raspberry beds 3 feet by 3 feet and have large clumps of raspberry plants growing in twelve of these beds. Blueberries don't necessarily need to be in a bed, and can function quite nicely in the naturalized part of the yard. I don't grow blackberries but would use the same method as for the raspberries. I think that 3 by 3 or 4 by 4 for each clump of plants is nearly ideal. I planted my raspberry plants last year, but didn't like the arrangement when planted among my strawberry plants. After the season the plants were moved into the new arrangement, which seems to be working very well. This photo is of one cluster in its dedicated raised bed. The beds are on the east of a large tree in order to get afternoon and evening shade. Currently I am still growing a few things in the open spaces of the beds even though they are not completely full of soil yet. In a year or two these raised beds should be totally dominated by the raspberry plants and we will likely get more berries than we can consume and give away.

[img]https://farm5.static.flickr.com/4061/4534384167_b4fb3e29d2_o.jpg[/img]

[GayRioGrower]

gayriogrower,

I guess it depends on how many mouths you are feeding. My beds are about 4ft x 20ft. I have heritage raspberries, marrionberries, triple crown thornless, and several blue berries. I will be selling extra fruit at the Farmers Market. 3ft x 12 sounds like a good place to start.

Everbearing varieties will give you fruit the year planted.

Well, I live with 5 others, and have family I could share with, so I don't think I could have too many berries, who doesn't like berries. But yeah, I have to be realistic about it. Do you have a 4ft x 20ft for each berry variety, or do you just have it for all your berries? I wanted to get a variety of each plant, so I could harvest longer through the season. And do you think 4ft is an ideal width, cause I was thinking two foot, but don't want them crowded. Thanks.

[GayRioGrower]

I like to use a separate bed for each of those kinds of fruiting plants. I constructed my raspberry beds 3 feet by 3 feet and have twelve clumps of raspberry plants growing. Blueberries don't necessarily need to be in a bed, and can function quite nicely in the naturalized part of the yard. I don't grow blackberries but would use the same method as for the raspberries. I think that 3 by 3 or 4 by 4 for each clump of plants is nearly ideal. I planted by raspberry plants last year, but didn't like the arrangement when planted among my strawberry plants. This photo is of one cluster in its dedicated raised bed. The beds are on the east of a large tree in order to get afternoon and evening shade. Currently I am still growing a few things in the open spaces of the beds even though they are not even completely full of soil yet. In a year or two I expect that these raised beds will be totally dominated by the raspberry plants and we will likely get more berries than we can consume and give away.

[img]https://farm5.static.flickr.com/4061/4534384167_b4fb3e29d2_o.jpg[/img]

I like the idea that you have a seperate be for each, but how many are you feeding with your 9-16 sq. ft? Is that enough? It seems like you would need more space, but it seems like it's woring for you. Thanks for the help.

[DoubleDogFarm]

gayriogrower,

I have a 4 x 20 marrionberry
4 x 20 Heritage Raspberry
4 X 4 Triple Crown, with room up to 20ft
Blueberry House, two rows about 12Ft

I also planted Seacape and Shuksan strawberries this year, about 3ft wide 60ft long.

[applestar]

How do you like the Triple Crown blackberries? I planted 3 bare-root plants in fall of '08 so am expecting my first harvest this year.

The 2' width I think is insufficient for future growth. Also, with all of these berries, you'll need to set up some kind of bird-proofing, and the netting or the chickenwire need to be sufficiently removed from the berries that the birds won't pick through the openings. I think the canes/branches themselves would easily reach 4' wide, so the protective structure would probably need to be approximately 6' wide.

I have to get working on caging my blueberry plants and need to figure something out for the blackberries as well as a plan ready for the Kiwi Gold raspberries, though last year, the birds didn't bother the raspberries. Catbirds, Mockingbirds, and Robins.

[DoubleDogFarm]

How do you like the Triple Crown blackberries? I planted 3 bare-root plants in fall of '08 so am expecting my first harvest this year.

I really like them, but they are like all blackberries, don't rush them. Wait until they are black, black, black, then they are oh so juicy.

Blackberries and ice cream, Oooh Iccce cream, gotta go, seeya later bye.

[hendi_alex]

Gayriogrower, I just reread my post and found it to be very confusing, so it has been edited. We have twelve 3 x 3 raised beds each of which has a large clump of raspberries. That is a little over 100 square feet of bed space. In another year or two that will be twelve very large clumps of raspberries which should make many quarts of berries.

[Sage Hermit]

wow I was going to try and get information on raspberries too.

I have so many rasp berries and want to make beds for them, should I move them to one location. I have like 15 acres and they have spread out all over the place. I think I should transplant them to one patch but I could really use some help on how that should be done carefully.

I'm worried I might damage the raspberries because Ive never had to dig up raspberries and relocate them before and I don;t want to loose em.

I wouldnt mind covering a very large area in rasp berries. Please any help will be much appreciated.

[Gary350]

The size of the berry patch has to do with how many berries you want. My blackberry patch is 4 ft by 15 ft. I can pick 5 gallons of berries from it. Blackberries will produce as long as you continue to pick every single berry from it. If you miss just 1 berry it will stop producing berries. If you can not reach a berry then get a long pole and knock that berry off. When my berries start producing about July 4th I can pick 1/2 gallon every day for a week then 2 cups every day for about 3 weeks then it slows down to 1 cup a week for 3 months. I have picked berries until October but I have to pick every day to make sure I don't miss any berries. Summer of 2008 I picked 5 gallons of berries. Summer of 2009 I made blackberry cobblers, pies, jelly, pancake syrup I only picked the berries for about 4 weeks then let it stop making berries.

I would love to grow RED raspberries but I don't have the room. Do not plant red and black raspberries together or anywhere within 1/4 mile of each other. Black raspberries carry a virus that will kill the red raspberries.

My Aunt has a 5ft by 20 ft grape arber. It is 6 poles 6 ft tall with 2x4 board from post to post on top covered with 1x4 boards with 4" spaces between all the boards. The grapes grow up the pole and across the top. The grapes hand down through the spaces in the boards. Wow she gets a lot of grapes. I have seen her pick 3 bushel baskets of grapes.

My neighbor makes wine he has 6 grape vines growing on wires that fun parallel to the ground. He has 2 rows with 3 plants in each row. Each plant is about 10 ft apart. He did not pick grapes the first year but the second year he did. He got a 5 gallon bucket of grapes the second year. This year will be his third year so I don't know how many grape he will get this year.

I know someone that has blue berries the bushes are about 5 ft diameter 7 ft tall. One bush will produce 5 gallons of berries.

[farmerlon]

I'm worried I might damage the raspberries because Ive never had to dig up raspberries and relocate them before and I don;t want to loose em.

I wouldnt mind covering a very large area in rasp berries. Please any help will be much appreciated.

They are quite rugged, and will usually tolerate moving pretty well.
You can also just cut out "root sections" of the plants where the new shoots are popping up, and transplant those. That's a great way to multiply your Raspberry plants.

[farmerlon]

I want to grow raspberries, blackberries, blueberries, and grapes, and just wanted to know what an ideal bed size would be.

I suggest that you avoid crowding the Blackberry and Raspberry plants when you make a new planting. As the roots spread and send up new shoots (year after year), they will tend to "crowd" or fill in any available area anyway.

Also, you may need to treat the soil for your Blueberry area differently than the cane berries. The Blueberries will thrive in a light soil (add lots of organic matter before planting) with a low pH. You may need to add some Sulfur to achieve an ideal pH for Blueberries (around 4.5 to 5 pH).

[hendi_alex]

I moved my beds at the end of last summer and don't think that a singe piece died. I had so many extra sprigs that were place in one gallon nursery pots, to give to friends. Yesterday, I even noticed where some roots were dropped on top of mulched land scape fabric, about a half dozen sprigs of new growth are trying to make a home there. So I wouldn't worry about the plants. They are pretty tough to kill, and this time of the year should be pretty easy on them, though as with anything moving when domant is better.

[hendi_alex]

Here is a photo of my main raspberry bed. There are currently 8 beds in this location, with room for two more. We have a secondary location that has two beds. I was thinking that there were 12 beds, but are only 9, with room for two more and with lots of plants growing in containers. The beds are a work in progress and still need a good bit of soil. It is also time to rake the leaves back over the landscape fabric. Lots of containers have been recently moved and all of the activity dislocated my rather flighty mulch.

[img]https://farm3.static.flickr.com/2710/4540932820_f066b7e770_o.jpg[/img]

[GeorgiaGirl]

Hmm... may I ask an offshoot question? It seems that everyone has specific beds for their berries. I planted 10 blueberrry bushes and 4 blackberry but I incorporated them into the landscaping... I.e. I didn't create specific beds for them (certainly not raised beds) although I did amend the soil well before planting.

Is there a reason everyone seems to have their berries in specific beds? I know some berries can tend to spread and I have my blackberries in an area where it will be easy to keep them in check, but I'm wondering if I did something wrong... I do have strawberries in their own little "island" surrounded by sidewalk... but nothing else is in a formal cordoned-off bed.

[hendi_alex]

I think that incorporating berries into a naturalized landscape is the absolute best approach, if you can have moderate to good success doing that. My ground is so dry and so sandy poor, with so much competition from the roots of oaks and other large trees, that switching to dedicated beds was the only way that I've had good success. Most of my blueberry bushes are in the ground as part of the landscape and they do fine in those locations.

[GeorgiaGirl]

Thanks, Alex - so far the blueberries I planted last fall are thriving... I think it's because they're in a formerly pine-forest area so the soil is rich/foresty and also naturally acidic. We do have high clay content here, but apparently it's enough to keep the roots moist but still with a good amount of natural organic material and plenty of earthworms doing their work. The blackberries were just planted recently... we shall see how they do..

[applestar]

My blackberries are "walking" out of their designated area.
I'll have to be a bit more aggressive about pruning them from here on out, but I wanted them to have the chance to grow and establish. The canes that arched over and touched ground have basically ground-layered and rooted. I cut them off the mother plants earlier this spring and I'm going to start another patch with these babies.

I used to have the wild terribly thorny blackberries but these are thornless and are easier to deal with.

As for my blueberries, I use the branches from the Christmas tree to much them, and also collect and use pine needles.