In early spring, it's time to prune your fall raspberries to clear the way for the canes that will bear this year's crop. Prune now for a bountiful late summer harvest.
Fall raspberries are best planted during winter dormancy and should be cut back to the ground when planted. After fruiting, you can cut all canes back to the ground so that they will sprout again next spring.
Fall raspberries are easy to prune. Unlike summer-fruiting raspberries, where you have to distinguish between the canes that bore fruit last summer and the new canes that will bear fruit this summer. The autumn-fruiting raspberry varieties bloom and fruit in the same year and therefore have different requirementsbe cutthan the summer raspberries.
For fall-fruiting varieties, you can prune fall raspberries simply by cutting back all the canes in one fell swoop - and February is the perfect time to do this. The fruit you will harvest in late summer/fall this year will be on new canes that will grow and bear fruit this year.
In February, cut back all old, fruit-bearing shoots to ground level. In the spring, new canes sprout that will bear fruit later in the year. Reduce the number of hives slightly in summer if they are very crowded. In the summer, remove any offshoots that grow out of the rows.
How to make the cut?
Depending on the thickness of the canes, take garden shears or pruning shears and cut the canes as far down as possible. They are quite tough, so if you want to throw them into the compost heap, you should run them through a shredder first.
Cut the canes back to 22cm immediately after planting. As new shoots develop at the base of the plants, cut off the old canes near the ground. In the following yearscut in winter, no later than February, return all rods to ground level.
Established raspberry plants produce many new shoots in spring. Make sure each row bed is 75-90cm wide to accommodate new shoots and remove any that appear outside the strip. If necessary, thin the shoots so that they are 8 to 10 cm apart.
You can get a small, extra early harvest from your fall raspberries by leaving some canes uncut. This does not appear to significantly reduce yield in the fall.
If you live in a particularly cold region, you should leave the canes alone after fruiting and wait until spring. This will avoid the risk of frost affecting new growth. In spring, simply cut all canes back to the ground to encourage new year's growth and remove weak shoots.
Another advantage of spring pruning for fast-growing autumn varieties is that you can achieve two different harvest times.You just cutcut some of the canes back to a height of 1 m in early spring and the rest to the ground. The less heavily pruned canes will produce fruit in the summer, while the rest of the canes will produce raspberries as usual in the fall.
Pruning autumn raspberries: care after pruning
Once all the canes have been cut back, you can use this opportunity to weed along the row. Be careful, however, because raspberries have very shallow roots, so you don't damage the roots when removing the weeds. When the raspberries are tidy and weed-free, add a handful at the endfertilizer into the soiland a layer of mulch to keep weeds at bay.
Raspberries tend to wander. Therefore, when caring for the row, pay attention to the shoots that appear here and there. If they spread too far, lift them out with a fork and keep the rows neat and under control. It's also a good time to check that the posts and wires supporting the raspberries are sturdy and in good condition - replace any rotten posts and tighten the wires if necessary.
As the days get longer and the temperatures rise, the plants put up new, strong canes. Tie these to the sticks and look forward to a late summer harvest of sun-ripened berries.
