Raspberry canes cutting back

Pruning Raspberries in Late Winter/Early Spring

The growth and fruiting characteristics of the raspberry plant are rather unique. The plant's roots and crown are perennial, while the stems or canes are biennial. Each spring, purple, black, and red raspberries produce new canes from buds located at the base of the previous year's growth. Red raspberries also produce new shoots from buds located on their roots. The individual canes live 2 years and then die.

The shoots of purple, black, and summer-bearing red raspberries are strictly vegetative during their first growing season. The following year, these same canes flower, produce fruit, and then die.

The growth and fruiting characteristics of fall-bearing red raspberries are slightly different. Fall-bearing varieties naturally produce two crops. The first crop is produced in late summer or early fall at the tips of the current season's growth. The following year, a summer crop is produced on the lower portions of these same canes. After the second crop, the canes die.

A number of yellow raspberry varieties are also available. With the exception of fruit color, the growth and fruiting characteristics of yellow raspberries are identical to red raspberries.

All raspberries should be pruned in March or early April. Late winter/early spring pruning procedures for the different types of raspberries are outlined below.

Summer-Bearing Red Raspberries

Remove all weak, diseased, and damaged canes at ground level. Leave the most vigorous canes, those approximately 1/4 inch in diameter when measured 30 inches from the ground. After thinning, remaining canes should be spaced about 6 inches apart.

Also, prune out the tips of the canes which have died due to winter injury. Cut back to live tissue. If the canes have suffered little winter dieback, remove the top 1/4 of the canes. Cane-tip removal or "heading-back" prevents the canes from becoming top heavy and bending over under the weight of the crop.

Red raspberries sucker profusely from their roots. To prevent the planting from becoming a wide, unmanageable thicket, red raspberries should be confined to a one- to two-foot-wide hedgerow. Shoots growing beyond the one- to two-foot-wide hedgerow should be destroyed using a rototiller or spade.

Fall-Bearing Red Raspberries

Two Crop System for Fall-Bearing Red Raspberries

Follow the same pruning procedures as described for the summer-bearing red raspberries. This pruning option provides both a summer and fall crop.

One Crop System for Fall-Bearing Red Raspberries

Prune all canes back to ground level in March or early April. While the plants won't produce a summer crop, the late summer/early fall crop should mature one to two weeks earlier. Also, total crop yield is typically larger utilizing the one-crop system versus the two-crop system. Maintain the plants in a 1- to 2-foot-wide hedgerow.

Yellow Raspberries

The pruning of summer-bearing and fall-bearing yellow raspberries is identical to their red raspberry counterparts.

Black and Purple Raspberries

Remove the small, weak canes, leaving only four or five of the largest, most vigorous canes per clump or plant. Cut back the lateral (side) branches to 12 inches in length for black raspberries and 18 inches for purple raspberries.

When pruning is completed, remove the pruned material from the garden area and destroy it. Removal and destruction of the pruned material helps control raspberry diseases, such as anthracnose and spur blight.

Issue:

February 9, 2011

Category:

Garden Management, Maintenance, & Design

Tags:

pruning

raspberries

small fruit

Authors:

Links to this article are strongly encouraged, and this article may be republished without further permission if published as written and if credit is given to the author, Horticulture and Home Pest News, and Iowa State University Extension and Outreach. If this article is to be used in any other manner, permission from the author is required. This article was originally published on February 9, 2011. The information contained within may not be the most current and accurate depending on when it is accessed.

How And When To Trim Raspberry Bushes

Raspberries

By: Nikki Tilley, Author of The Bulb-o-licious Garden

Image by popovariel

Growing raspberries is a great way to enjoy your own tasty fruits year after year. However, in order to get the most from your crops, it’s important to practice annual pruning raspberry pruning. So how do you prune raspberry bushes and when? Let’s find out.

Why You Should Prune Raspberry Plants?

Pruning raspberry bushes improves their overall health and vigor. In addition, when you prune raspberry plants, it helps increase fruit production. Since raspberries grow only foliage the first season (year) and flowers and fruit the next (second year), removing dead canes can make it easier to obtain a maximum yield and berry size.

When to Trim Raspberry Bushes

How and when to prune raspberries depends on the type you are growing.

Everbearing (sometimes referred to as fall-bearing) produce two crops, summer and fall.
Summer crops, or summer-bearing, produce fruit on the previous season’s (fall) canes, which can be removed after the summer harvest and again in spring after the threat of frost and prior to new growth.
Fall-bearing types produce on first year’s canes and are thus pruned back after the late fall harvest when dormant.

How Do You Prune Raspberry Bushes?

Again, pruning techniques depend on variety. Red raspberries produce suckers at the base of previous season’s growth while black (and purple) form on new growth.

Red Raspberry Bush Pruning

Summer-bearing – Remove all weak canes to the ground in early spring. Leave 10 to 12 of the healthiest canes, about ¼ inches (0. 5 cm.) in diameter, with 6 inch (15 cm.) spacing. Tip prune any that may have suffered cold damage. Following summer harvest, prune off the old fruiting canes to the ground.

Fall-bearing – Fall-bearing can be pruned for either one crop or two. For two crops, prune as you would summer-bearing, then again after the fall harvest, pruning to the ground. If only one crop is desired, there’s no need to prune in summer. Instead, cut all canes to the ground in spring. There will be no summer crop, only one in fall using this method.

Note: Yellow varieties are also available and their pruning is the same as for the red types.

Black or Purple Raspberry Bush Pruning

Remove fruiting canes after harvest. Tip prune new shoots in early spring 3 to 4 inches (8-10 cm.) to encourage branching. Top these canes again 3 to 4 inches (8-10 cm.) in summer. Then after harvest, remove all dead canes and those smaller than ½ inches (1 cm.) in diameter. The following spring, prune out weak canes, leaving only four to five of the healthiest and largest. Cut back the lateral branches of black varieties to 12 inches (31 cm.) and purple types to about 18 inches (46 cm.).

This article was last updated on 07/27/21

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90,000 pruning raspberries in the summer: scheme and advice

Content

Why cut raspberries
Features of summer pruning raspberry shoots
Summer varieties of raspberries
Campaign of autumn raspberries in the summer of
Advantages and disadvantages
Pruning of raspberry shoots according to Sobolev

Raspberries are familiar to all of us since childhood. This delicious delicacy can be found in almost every garden, as adults and children love raspberries. This is a plant with the presence of annual and biennial shoots. Usually raspberries are low shrubs that have a well-developed root system. It is common for a berry plant to bring good yields, and in order to ensure their stability, it must be borne in mind that raspberries need to be properly looked after.

Raspberries rarely get sick, especially if planted in the right place. The condition of the soil will mainly influence the further development of the raspberry. The earth must have enough nutrients to provide plants throughout each year, then raspberries will always bring a bountiful harvest.

Why cut raspberries

There are situations when planting the same variety in different summer cottages, their owners observe completely different fruiting. When the raspberry looks outwardly healthy, but does not bring berries, then the reason for this may be the incorrect formation of the shoots. Experienced gardeners know that the most important step in processing raspberries is pruning. This type of work is not carried out in one sitting, but seasonally: in autumn, spring and summer. As a result of not allowing the raspberry to grow freely, it simply turns into a wild plant. Of course, the planting of bushes must be corrected, leaving only strong and healthy shoots. Nevertheless, the natural growth of this culture occurs due to the rapid development of the root system, which tends to capture neighboring territories. Due to such aggressive natural reproduction, plants spend a lot of energy, all useful reserves are spent on creating new shoots. For this reason, flowering stops in mature bushes, as there is not enough energy. If the raspberries are not pruned in the fall, up to twenty new root shoots can grow from one bush.

In remontant raspberry bushes, berries may already appear in the first season after planting. Usually, flower buds tend to appear on these plants after the second year of life. This happens in the vast majority of raspberry varieties. Therefore, after the expiration of the two-year period of growth of the bushes, their shoots must be cut. Thus, gardeners leave new shoots that originate from powerful roots. Let us consider in more detail what the density of raspberry rows affects:

With the assumption of a strong growth of shoots, the raspberry crop not only thins out, but also becomes smaller.
The thicker the bushes grow, the more foci of plant diseases can occur, since favorable conditions are created for the reproduction of insects and attracting other pests.
Berries of varietal and remontant raspberries are significantly different in taste from those that grow in thinned raspberries.
If you do not prune raspberries on time, then there is a chance of losing not only new small shoots during the winter period, but also beautiful healthy shoots. This often happens as a result of an incorrect distribution of the movement of juice, which, when the bushes grow, is directed to the development of offspring, and not to saturate the fruiting shoots. Because of this, they can freeze slightly along with the root processes.

As can be seen from the above reasons, raspberry pruning is a must for every gardener. If the processing of plants is carried out on time and correctly, then you will inevitably receive an excellent stable harvest from raspberries in the form of high-quality berries.

Autumn and spring pruning of raspberry shoots provides for the stimulation of the growth of fruit-bearing bushes, on which flower buds will be laid in the future. Removing old and weak shoots in the best way affects the successful development of your raspberry, as the health of the plantation as a whole is maintained.

Peculiarities of summer pruning of raspberry shoots

As is known, the aerial part of this crop bears fruit for two years. With such a development cycle, it is not surprising that the plant tends to grow so aggressively and quickly with root shoots over the territory. Pruning, as a type of garden work, although also aimed at stimulating the growth of new bushes, but at the same time it provides for a healthy renewal of the raspberries. It becomes cleaner on the site, which means that this place attracts less pests and insects, raspberries stop hurting. Agrotechnics for pruning different varieties of raspberries may have some differences. Most often, the processing of bushes is carried out from September to October, or in the summer.

Pruning summer raspberries

When planting summer raspberries, cut the stem no more than twenty-five centimeters from the soil level. On the remaining stumps, the flowers are also cut off, because in the first year there will be no berries yet. Throughout the summer season, new shoots will appear on the site, which must be thinned out, leaving only strong shoots. During this period, it is important to maintain raspberry stems up to a height of twenty-five centimeters.

Next year you will be able to see a number of beautiful powerful shoots. For them, they usually construct a support with a wire stretch, on which the stems are tied. The wire of the topmost row should be about one and a half meters above the ground. Make the lower part of the stretch at a distance of ten centimeters from the soil level. After harvesting, young shoots with an optimally selected distance will be tied to the lower wire. Pruning of such shoots is done as close to the ground as possible.

Summer raspberries are very popular with gardeners. In most cases, with proper care from raspberries, you can harvest a tasty and plentiful harvest. The longer the stem, the more lateral branches can be located on it, on which berries grow.

Summer pruning of autumn raspberries

Autumn berries are harvested from the stem tops of side shoots. Raspberry pruning of these varieties is carried out in early spring. When processing bushes, all stems should be removed, since this procedure is more aimed at stimulating the rapid maturation of young fruit-bearing shoots. During the spring and summer periods, these shoots stretch out enough so that berries can appear on them already in September.

After the entire crop has been harvested, it is necessary to prune the shoots at ground level. Raspberries quickly give a new offspring, so you should not be afraid to cut the branches. By next spring, new shoots will grow in these places again, among which there will be both strong and weak ones. After examining the raspberry, you should remove all unnecessary processes. If you do this, then healthier shoots will begin to become even stronger and gradually gain strength. If there is a need, then you can tie the plants to the wire on the support. Bushes of autumn varieties are overgrown with shoots in one year, therefore pruning should be done the same way every season.

Advantages and disadvantages of the one-year development cycle of remontant raspberries

Many gardeners, in addition to varietal raspberry bushes, grow annual remontant raspberries on their plot. With such a development cycle of this plant, some advantages can be distinguished:

The main advantage of growing such a berry is the minimal succumbing to diseases. Due to the one-year development cycle, raspberries cut off the entire outer part of the stem in autumn, so fungi and pests do not have time to multiply in it.
Since the stems of the bushes are removed before the winter period, there is no need to worry about their freezing.

The disadvantages include the fact that there is not always enough time for the fruit to fully ripen during the summer. Often on the bushes you can observe ripe berries in the wrong cold season.

Experienced growers can harvest two harvests from one plot of remontant raspberries. If you do not cut the shoots, but leave them until next year, then the strongest of them will bring you a later harvest. This procedure is carried out when they want to extend the fruiting time and get as many fresh berries as possible.

So, summing up, we can say that pruning raspberries means the complete removal of shoots for the winter, and shortening them in the summer to twenty-five centimeters in length. It must not be forgotten that all cut material should be removed from the site and burned. Painful bacteria, viruses, and pests can overwinter in dry branches and leaves. Therefore, in order to protect your crop from many possible diseases, the best option is to dispose of all cuttings.

Pruning of raspberry shoots according to Sobolev

Back in the days of the Soviet Union, A. G. Sobolev proved that six kilograms of berries can be harvested from one raspberry bush. The method of pruning the bushes of this man has become a real discovery for all lovers of juicy and tasty raspberries. Many gardeners came to his house for advice to learn a unique way of growing raspberries. From childhood, Sobolev was closely associated with agriculture, but it took him more than one year to get such a plentiful harvest from raspberry bushes.

You can also try this man's cutting method and get great results. The essence of this method is to cut raspberry shoots in a strictly defined time frame.

The first pruning of raspberries is done in late spring or early June. When annual shoots grow from seven to ten centimeters to a meter, their tops are cut off. If you cut each branch by ten to fifteen centimeters, then this will further provoke a qualitative growth of side shoots. You yourself will be able to observe how the axillary buds are already activated in a few days, and by the end of August, processes up to half a meter will be in their place. Next year you will pick berries from these branches, so it is so important to observe the exact timing of pruning.

The second time the raspberry bushes should be pruned next spring after they are already covered with leaves. In this case, the top of fifteen centimeters should be removed from each side shoot. After such treatment, by the fruiting period, raspberries will have several dozen more fruit-bearing branches with ovaries.

Raspberry pruning according to the method of A. G. Sobolev is called double in the common people. If everything is done correctly, then you are guaranteed to succeed:

Prolong the harvest of ordinary varieties, make it early and late, bringing the fruiting time closer, like in remontant raspberries.
Increase the number of flower buds on each bush.
Increase the quality and quantity of crops.

Autumn pruning of bushes is carried out according to the same technology as in the traditional way. For the winter, raspberries are prepared by removing all immature, dry and diseased shoots, that is, they do a sanitary cleaning of the site.

Despite the simplicity of the Sobolev pruning method, if done correctly, gardeners eventually get the desired high yield. In addition to timely pruning of bushes, they also need to be watered and fertilized. There must be enough useful nutrients in the ground to ensure the normal development of raspberries. If the shoots are cut in time, then the planting density of raspberries will be the most acceptable with a severe restriction of side branches.

Alexander Sobolev recommends adhering to the following tips, which are common to all varieties of raspberries:

When planting raspberries, make sure that the beds are located from north to south.
So that raspberries are not exposed to lingering drafts and strong winds (especially in winter), it is necessary to plant bushes near a hedge or fence. The best landing site will be the south side.
Raspberry is not afraid of the proximity of groundwater to the surface of the earth, so these plants can be planted in areas with such features.
To obtain high yields, A. G. Sobolev recommends planting raspberries with a distance of one meter between rows, and with the same distance between bushes.
If the groundwater is at a considerable depth, or the area has an arid summer climate, then the plants should be watered frequently. An excellent option would be to raise the raspberry beds to a twenty-centimeter height above the ground cover. To do this, you can build a special box, for which slate is often used, or boards. This box will well retain moisture and fertilizers, which are so necessary for the raspberry root system. Thus, healthy nutrition is provided in the beds for the further growth of fruit-bearing shoots. Not only purchased mineral supplements (superphosphate), but also natural humus in combination with potassium are well suited as baits for raspberries.

Depending on the region where the raspberries are grown, this pruning method may need to be tried several times until the optimum is found. Raspberry growing areas have significant areas, so agricultural practices may differ for individual plots. The path to a successful harvest from raspberry beds can be found by the gardener's own experience.

how to prune shoots in June-July

Contents

When to prune raspberries: in June, July and August
How to prune
Double prune raspberries in summer
Why raspberries should be prune
Pruning repair raspberries

behind the plants. It is carried out in order to remove wilted or diseased shoots. If pruning is postponed until autumn, diseased bushes will infect the rest.

Excess growth also needs to be pruned, as it takes the nutrients from the raspberries that are necessary for the formation of berries.

Pruning in summer accelerates the formation of the aerial part of young plants. In fruit-bearing bushes, productivity increases.

When to prune raspberries: in June, July and August

In summer it is best to prune after the end of the harvest. This period is characterized by active growth of the aerial parts of plants. Pruning stimulates root development. The number of shoots and berries depends on the size of the root system.

How to cut correctly

Fruiting shoots must be cut out completely. Plants should be cut to ground level. If you leave stumps, diseases can arise there and pests can settle. This pruning can be done in the fall.

But it is during the summer period that young emerging shoots will receive the maximum amount of nutrients necessary for normal growth and development.

Raspberry sprouts that have finished fruiting usually dry up in autumn. In the summer, young growth grows from the basal buds, which will produce a crop for next year. When pruning in August, young shoots will better prepare for the cold and accumulate enough strength to survive the winter.

To increase the yield, all shoots that have grown by 65-75 cm should be cut to the length of a pencil. It is best to do this in early or mid-June. This procedure accelerates the formation of shoots and increases their number.

If there is a lot of free space between bushes, summer pruning encourages lateral branching. Thanks to this, the gaps between the bushes are filled and the yield is increased.

The basic rule for cutting is that the tool must be clean. When moving from plant to plant, the secateurs should be wiped with a cloth moistened with alcohol or another disinfectant.

Double pruning raspberries in summer

In addition to removing shoots after harvest, measures must be taken to limit the spread of raspberries in width. If the number of shoots exceeds 20 per 1 m², all excess plants are cut out approximately once every 10 days.

To reduce the number of shoots, the ground around the bush is dug up, retreating from the center of the bush by 60 cm. Roots found in the soil must be collected and taken outside the site.

Why trim raspberries

The quality of the crop directly depends on the summer pruning. If the bushes do not grow in breadth or height, the harvest will be plentiful, and the berries will be large and tasty. Constant pruning in the summer will result in a natural renewal of the raspberries.

Excess shoots, dried and diseased shoots significantly reduce the yield. Pruning should be carried out regularly, relieving healthy plants of all unnecessary. Postponing it for the fall is not worth it.

Pruning of remontant raspberries

In order not to be left without a harvest, remontant raspberries are not pruned in summer. Since such varieties bear fruit several times per season, the berries of the second crop grow smaller. Therefore, it is recommended to cut off all the buds in the first flowering period.