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Remontant raspberry is a real breakthrough in the selection work of scientists. Its popularity has not subsided for several decades, despite the fact that among gardeners there are still disputes about the suitability of this or that pruning or methods of growing remontant raspberry varieties. Yes, and caring for it cannot be called too simple, although in many ways it is much easier than for ordinary raspberries. In general, beginner gardeners are most interested in how to care for remontant raspberries, since opinions here sometimes differ, because each gardener has his own unique experience. And it strongly depends, both on the climatic features of the region where raspberries are grown, and on the characteristics of a particular raspberry variety.
Repair raspberry and its features
If we compare it with ordinary raspberries, then the latter is characterized by a two-year cultivation, when flowers and ovaries are formed on the shoots of the previous year, and all annuals go green in winter. Naturally, it takes time for flowers and ovaries to form, so remontant raspberries bear fruit closer to autumn.
If you give her the opportunity to go into the winter untouched, then in the spring these fruit-bearing branches will behave like ordinary two-year-old raspberry shoots. That is, in the summer, flowers will appear on them, and then berries. Simultaneously with them, the next young annual shoots will also develop. Thus, in the middle of summer, a remontant raspberry bush will consist, as it were, of two parts: two-year-old shoots with berries and one-year shoots that are just preparing for fruiting.
But such an ideal picture is possible only in the south. In most regions of Our Country, it is usually not possible to collect two crops. Since, due to the heavy load, the second fruiting is often postponed in time to autumn, when frosts often occur and the crop generally does not have time to ripen. That is why it is recommended to grow remontant raspberries in the so-called annual crop. In this case, raspberry bushes are cut at ground level in autumn after fruiting, and in spring new annual growths appear, which develop over the summer and give a good harvest of large and tasty berries by autumn.
But the cultivation and care of remontant raspberries, as well as its pruning, are still the subject of heated discussions among gardeners. Since it is difficult for most of them to come to terms with the fact that the harvest can only be obtained once a year, although not in the traditional season for raspberries. Therefore, many, despite all the recommendations, experiment with pruning remontant raspberries and sometimes get very interesting results.
Different types of pruning
So, pruning remontant raspberries has a clear relationship with the number of crops.
- If you want one large and high-quality crop, then cut off all the shoots under the root in late autumn.
- If you want to get two harvests, then do not touch anything in the fall.
But the cultivation of remontant raspberries is not for nothing that causes so much discussion.
- This is necessary for the southern regions, where a mild winter with many thaws can, when pruning remontant raspberries in the fall, cause premature budding.
- It is also useful for the northern and snowless regions, where raspberry shoots left before winter will help retain snow and prevent the root system from freezing. In addition, the breeder himself, who brought out all the latest varieties of remontant raspberries, was recommended to cut it in early spring.
But besides this, repair raspberries, like all ordinary varieties, must be rationed.
Rationing is carried out so that the raspberries have exactly as many shoots as they can feed. And so that each shoot can get enough light and nutrition for full fruiting. Regular raspberry varieties are very susceptible to thickening. Remontant raspberries have an advantage here too – most of its varieties do not form a very large number of shoots.
However, rationing is necessary for remontant raspberries too. Actually, caring for remontant raspberries in the spring begins with the rationing of the bush, if the cardinal pruning was done in the fall. To do this, you need to wait until young annual shoots grow out of the ground, and carefully cut out all the thin, weakened or simply superfluous ones. For each bush, no more than 4-7 (depending on the variety) strong and strong raspberry shoots should remain. This procedure can be quite combined with the propagation of raspberries.
In the video below, you can see one of the options for thinning and pruning remontant raspberries in the spring:
As for pruning, there is another agricultural technique that can significantly increase the productivity of bushes. Around the beginning of summer, when young raspberry shoots reach a height of about one meter, they must be cut to half the height. Bushes must be additionally fed and spilled. Sufficiently quickly pruned shoots are covered with a large number of branched fruit twigs, from which a good harvest can be harvested in August-September.
Landing
You can plant remontant raspberries both in autumn and in spring. In the southern regions, it is better to plant in the fall, since at this time the most favorable conditions are created for the survival of the bushes. Moreover, due to mild winters, there is no danger of freezing of the root system in the very first months after planting.
This opportunity is often used by gardeners of temperate latitudes.
For planting raspberries, choose the most sunny and wind-protected areas. This is especially true for the northern regions. Even slight shading can lead to a decrease in its yield.
Planting and caring for raspberries in the future requires a very thoughtful approach, since remontant raspberries can grow in one place up to 10-13 years and all this time it is quite capable of producing significant yields. Groundwater should not be located higher than 1,5 m from the ground surface. It is impossible to place future plantations in the place where solanaceous crops used to grow: tomatoes, peppers, eggplants, potatoes. Raspberries are returned to the place of the former raspberry planting no earlier than after 6-7 years.
The soil for planting raspberries should be fertile and loose. When preparing a site for planting raspberries, about three buckets of decomposed humus or compost are introduced per square meter. Peat and wood ash additives will also be good.
When choosing a planting scheme for remontant raspberries, thickening of plantings should not be allowed. On average, there can be about 3-4 raspberry bushes per square meter. The most common planting pattern is row, with a distance between plants of about 60-80 cm. Leave at least 2-2,5 m between rows.
At the same time, the distance between plants is reduced to 50 cm. This method of planting creates ideal lighting conditions for the bushes.
The planting technique itself has no fundamental differences from planting ordinary raspberries. You can plant bushes either in trenches or in pits. It is important that the planting depth is exactly the same at which the plant grew before. Both deepening and high planting adversely affect the further development of seedlings. After planting, the seedlings must be shed well, using about 10 liters of water per bush.
The video below shows the process of planting remontant raspberry seedlings of the Firebird variety:
In many sources, you can find a recommendation to cut off the entire aerial part after planting near raspberry bushes. This is done mainly to prevent the spread of foci of infection, which can persist on the shoots. But this operation also has adverse consequences. In this part, the plants concentrate the maximum number of nutrients necessary for their development in the first time after planting. Therefore, one should consider whether to apply this technique, especially in areas with a harsh climate, where the absorption of nutrients from the external environment is difficult.
Care
Answering the question of how to grow remontant raspberries, one cannot fail to mention the actions that are mandatory for all temperate latitudes, which allow you to speed up the ripening of raspberries. In early spring, it is necessary to carry out a number of procedures to improve the warming of the soil.
- It is necessary to clear the snow from those places where raspberries grow.
- Cover plantings with non-woven fabric or film.
- For the spring period, you can even build a frame using covering materials before the onset of constantly warm weather.
- Initially, plant raspberries in tall, warm beds with lots of organic matter inside them.
Feeding raspberries
Growing remontant raspberries, as well as caring for them, should, first of all, be aimed at obtaining a plentiful and high-quality harvest. Therefore, regular feeding is one of the main ways to care for raspberry plantings. It is possible to use mineral fertilizers – in this case, in the first half of summer, mainly nitrogen fertilizers are applied, and starting from mid-summer, they are fed every week with phosphorus, potassium and a complete set of trace elements, preferably in chelated form.
A wonderful tool for maintaining optimal humidity in raspberry plantings is mulching the bushes. In the fall, after pruning the shoots, plantings can be mulched with a layer of humus or rotted sawdust, 10 cm high. In the spring, this layer of mulch will serve as a source of additional nutrition for raspberries. Moreover, by the summer, the layer of mulch must be increased; on hot days, it will help retain moisture at the roots of plants.
What else does a repair raspberry need?
Caring for remontant raspberries is facilitated by the fact that most varieties do not grow very large in height. The average height of the bushes is from one to one and a half meters. Therefore, labor-intensive operations for installing trellises and tying up bushes when caring for remontant varieties can be excluded. But watering must be taken with great responsibility. Indeed, without a sufficient amount of water, raspberry bushes will not be able to develop well, which will certainly affect the yield. On the other hand, excess moisture can also kill raspberries. If you have a large enough raspberry plantation, then it is advisable to build a drip irrigation system.
The best option would be to mulch with straw or sawdust both the plantings themselves and the row spacing.
Reproduction
No matter how you take care of the bushes, after 10-12 years, remontant raspberries need to be transplanted. The easiest way to propagate raspberry bushes is root layering. Although, unlike ordinary raspberry varieties, remontant ones form not so much shoots. But remontant raspberries also propagate well from root cuttings. It just takes a little more time. In autumn, in cloudy weather, it is necessary to dig out several fruit-bearing raspberry bushes and carefully separate 1/5-1/6 of its part from each bush. Rhizomes are divided into pieces about 10 cm long, while the thickness of the cuttings should be at least 3 mm. In order to grow full-fledged seedlings from these cuttings, you can go in two ways:
- The cuttings are immediately planted horizontally in a prepared bed with loose, fertile soil and covered with a 5-10 cm layer of organic mulch on top.
- The cuttings are stored until spring in a cellar in wet sawdust or moss. In the spring, they germinate in warmth and are also planted in beds.
By autumn, seedlings are obtained from these cuttings, which can be transplanted to a permanent place.
An interesting way to propagate remontant raspberries is cuttings of shoots pruned in autumn. Instead of throwing them away, they can be cut into small pieces 20-30 cm long and immediately stuck into a small nursery with loose soil. For the winter, the cuttings are well insulated with a layer of straw, and in the spring they are already covered with buds. By autumn, rooted cuttings are transplanted from the nursery to a permanent place. In transplanted bushes, flowering and ovary formation should not be allowed in the current season, otherwise the plants may be greatly weakened.
Of course, growing remontant raspberries cannot be called simple, but you will definitely be rewarded for your work with a large harvest of tasty and fragrant berries, especially at a time when all other berries have already departed.