Backyard Berries

 Berries are a great low maintenance and nutritious way to increase home production.  They are absolutely one of my favorite crops.  I have a variety of berries and continue to add new ones each year.  Berries can be incorporated into the landscape unless deer are a problem in which case have a designated berry patch behind a fence.  

There is so much you can do with berries.  The most rewarding thing about berries is eating them fresh and ripe. They are the one crop my children, grandchildren, and extended family love to help harvest.  In addition to fresh eating they are easily frozen, canned, turned into juice, jelly, sauces, and pie fillings.  Berries provide an essential source of antioxidants and vitamins and many of the leaves, flowers, and berries have medicinal purposes.  They are a must for the serious gardener or homesteader. 

 I have tried three varieties of raspberries with three different maturity dates. The goal was to have berries all season.  I have tried Kilarney, Taylor, and Caroline. Caroline by far out perform the other varieties and if you can only plant one Caroline will not disappoint you. Last year I planted Polka and am very happy with the large abundant raspberries.  I am trying Encore and I have heard good reviews about Meeker.  I like ever bearing because you get a crop early spring and throughout the growing season

 

Jostaberries are a cross between a gooseberry and a currant. They are a large, beautiful bushes.  The berries are tart like a sour grape and ripen to deep purple almost black berry.  They make great desserts and jellies and work well in the landscape.  Warning: deer enjoy this bush and the berries.

Pink Champagne Currants

I have 3 types of currants: black, red, and white.  The white or pink champagne can be eaten off the bush.  All three can be used for juice, jelly, jams, and medical purposes.

Pink Champagne 

I think blackberries are my favorite.  I grow the semi erect and erect varieties. They are more productive than trailing varieties which seem to prefer a warmer zone.  For more detailed information on blackberry and raspberry culture refer to this post:

Brambles: Growing Blackberries and Raspberries

Blackberries are easy to freeze for later use.  Just wash them and allow them to dry.  Spread them on a sheet of parchment paper and tray.  Freeze and then store in freezer bags.

Strawberries

 Strawberries are probably the most widely planted berry.  My favorite is a new cultivar called Albion. It produces from early spring til first frost with the largest cropping occurring in mid summer through the fall.  Albion produces large extremely sweet berries on vigorous plants.  An early application of chelated iron is important and thinning out the runners and plants in early spring.

Growing Strawberries

Elderberries are an easy to grow berry now getting more attention for it's medicinal and health benefits. They are high in Vitamin C and antioxidants.  They make delicious pies, jams, jellies, and syrups as well.   There are also elderberry cultivars used strictly in landscape and new cultivars which are grown for berry production. They have fragrant large flowers and deep purple almost black  fruit.  Both flowers and fruits are edible.  They produce canes in a clump and like to spread.  They will grow up to 15 feet so give them room.

Elderberry flowers

The flowers can be dried and used in teas.  The berries are used in extracts, syrups, jams, jellies, and pies.  To harvest I cut the entire flower cluster and freeze it.  Then just shake the berries off onto a cooke tray.  Beware:  Birds love this berry.  You may have to cover a few clusters with netting to be sure you get some.

Elderberry bush in flower.  A very productive plant.  Birds love these.

I like the Dutch cultivars breed for berry production including Sampo, Samyl and Samdol.  I also have York and Adams in my landscape but they have smaller berries.

Gooseberries.  This variety ripens to a deep rose color.  Deer resistant because of all the spines.

Gooseberries are less familiar to American gardens but popular in European gardens.  This 3 to 5 foot bush with arching branches produces slightly tart green fruits the size of a marble.  Some cultivars ripen to a pink or burgundy.  The skins are translucent and the fruit has a tail. They ripen throughout July and hold on the bush nicely.

Gooseberries are in the ribes family along with currants. Unlike the currant, gooseberries have thorns which means careful picking but also means you can use these woody shrubs in the landscape because the deer will steer clear.

Growing Gooseberries

Nanking cherries, not a berry but a great landscape plant and very productive and used like a berry.

The nanking cherry is both ornamental and edible.  It is beautiful and provides small bright red cherries that are great in pies, jams, syrups, and jellies.  The nanking cherry also know as the Manchu cherry, can be a twiggy shrub or pruned as a small tree.  It is useful in windbreaks and edible landscapes. Technically this is not a berry but used in the same manner as berries so I consider it a backyard berry.

Growing Nanking Cherries

Hybrid Berries

Last year I planted some of the hybrid berries to see how they would do in my area.  

Year old boysenberry it survived our winter.

Boysenberries have blackberry, raspberry, and loganberry heritage. There are thorny and thornless cultivars available.  Boysenberries require a moist soil to produce fruit so don't let the soil dry out. They are self pollinating.

New vegetative cans of a loganberry

Loganberries are a cross between red raspberries and blackberries.  The canes are thornless.  They canes grow horizontal to the ground so they need a trellis.  The canes can be attached to the trellis like a fan this keeps the fruit off the ground. They also are self pollinating.

The very thorny Marion berry.

Marion berries are considered the best of the blackberries.  They are a cross between Chehalem (a native cross blackberry, raspberry, and loganberry) and Olallie berry (another blackberry cross)  They trail along the ground and have and abundance of large thorns. They also need to be trellised.

Tayberries are a cross between a raspberry and blackberry.  They are a large reddish purple berry up to 1 1/2 long.  When picked they retain the respectable (core) like a blackberry.  They are thorny and trailing so they can be trellised in a fan shape. Tayberries are the new berry I am adding to my berry patch.  

   

I hope this has exposed you to some new options for your backyard berry patch. So many delicious possibilities!