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“Method of Training Blackberry Plants”

My method for training blackberry plants starts with one set of stakes set about eight feet apart on each side of the row, about a foot away from the blackberry plants.

These stakes should be at least four feet tall, and strong enough to stand the strain of two wires run along the blackberry plants from one end of the row to the other.

The first wire should measure about two feet from the ground, and the other wire should run along the blackberry plants near the top. During the spring, I tie the canes of last year’s blackberry growth, the fruiting stalks of the plants, dividing them as evenly as possible between the two sides of the row.

The purpose for training the blackberry plants is two fold.
The first reason, it helps support the canes in such a manner that the fruit from the blackberry plants are easier to pick during harvest time and the training helps reduce the chance of the canes likely falling under their own weight.

Secondly, their fruit is kept away from the dirt helping to reduce the chance of soil born disease. This also allows the new growth of the season to be tied up in the middle of the row where it will not interfere in the least with the fruit-bearing portions of the plants.

After the blackberry plant’s old canes have ripened their crop of fruit, cut them off. They have completed their work, and the sooner they are out of the way the better.

Next year the growth of this season should be
spread out and tied to the wires in the same manner, and the
plants allowed to renew themselves by sending up a growth of canes, as described above.

This process of blackberry plants goes on year after year. The old roots remain, but we get an entirely new growth of fruiting stalks each season.

This method works out quite well as it keeps the growth of each season apart, and makes it easy to remove the old wood.

You will run in to problems if you allow the growth of each season to mix with the previous season. If you allow this to happen, your plants will become bushy and serious injury can occur to your hands.

When this happens your blackberry plants are left alone, and after a year or two of neglect the plants fail to provide good fruit crops or “have run out”.

Many backyard gardeners fail with their crop of raspberry or blackberry plants for this reason. They figure the plants are no good and they end up pulling them out.

As long as you keep pruning your blackberry or raspberry canes after they have produced your crop of fruit, your plants will continue to produce a fruit harvest for you.

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