Hybrid berries

Berried
treasures

Taste of
1
Boxed numbers in the text refer to
the following:

2 1 Blackberry Helen
2 Blackberry Ouachita
3 Blackberry Navaho

Summer
4 Blackberry Reuben
5 Blackberry Obsidian
6 Blackberry Loch Tay agm
7 Loganberry
8 Blackberry Loch Ness agm

Photographed 13 August 2015

at RHS Garden Wisley, Surrey.

Blackberries scrumped from prickly hedgerows

are synonymous with late summer, but cultivated
plants can offer better crops, a longer season and 4

spine-free picking, as an RHS Plant Trial reveals

Author: Jim Arbury, Fruit and Trials Specialist, RHS Garden Wisley.
Photography: Tim Sandall

RHS Plant Trial

3

A
ugust is usually when our prickly hedgerow
brambles begin to tempt passers-by with
their succulent, ripening fruit; few people
can resist their juicy sweetness. Delicious
as the berries may be, wild brambles are
far removed from cultivated and greatly improved
blackberries and hybrid berries. Highly productive and
ornamental when in fruit, they make a good choice for
garden cultivation and are easily trained on walls, fences
and arches, as well as being suitable for growing on free-
standing posts and wires. Many kinds are thornless and
also of greatly reduced vigour, so are more manageable.
Blackberries and their hybrids
Members of the genus Rubus, there are hundreds of
species of blackberry including our native brambles
(many species, grouped under R. fruticosus) and
raspberries (R. idaeus). Cultivated blackberries are
usually hybrids often involving species from
overseas but most are hardy throughout the UK
to H6 (20 to 15c/4 to 5f). Much breeding work
has also produced a range of hybrid cane fruits, the
current emphasis focusing on black-fruited plants.
One of the first of these popular hybrid berries was
Rubus x loganobaccus (loganberry) 7 , raised by Judge
James Logan in California in the 1880s from a chance
cross between a Pacific coast dewberry and a European
red raspberry (probably Red Antwerp).
62 The Garden | August 2016
5 of blackberries
and hybrid berries
A trial of 19 cultivars of blackberry and hybrid berries was
planted at RHS Garden Wisley, Surrey in winter 2011/12 and
assessed in 201315. Entries were evaluated for fruit quality
(size, appearance and taste both fresh and cooked), yield,
6 ease of picking, plant vigour and pest and disease resistance.
Cultivars varied in fruiting season and habit: in 2015 early
ones started cropping in July (June in 2014), finishing in
August, while later cultivars started in August and cropped
until the end of November.
After the trial, blackberry Loch Tay earned an Award
7
of Garden Merit (agm) while blackberry Loch Ness and
Tayberry Group both had agms re-confirmed.
Thorns or thornless?
Thornless: blackberry cultivars Asterina, Caanska
Bestrna, Chester, Helen, Loch Maree, Loch Ness, Loch
Tay, Natchez, Navaho, Ouachita and Triple Crown.
Also loganberry (an unnamed thornless selection) and
Tayberry Group Buckingham.
With thorns: blackberry cultivars Black Butte, Karaka
Black, Obsidian and Reuben. Also Tayberry Group
and Tummelberry.
8
To see the trial report, visit www.rhs.org.uk/planttrials,
click on RHS Trials Database and search Blackberry.
August 2016 | The Garden 63
 Hybrid berries

Guide to cultivation
Supporting and training
Blackberries and hybrid berries are best supported on
horizontal wires attached to freestanding posts, walls or
fences. Use 2.5mm galvanised wire spaced at 30cm (12in)
apart, the first wire about 60cm (24in) from the ground,
the last at 1.8m (6ft), allowing 2.54m (813ft) per plant,
depending on cultivar. Some have trailing canes, others
are more upright; all can be fan-trained (as in the trial).
After planting in winter or early spring, cut
canes back to 20cm (8in) to stimulate basal
shoots. These develop into new, fruiting
canes which can be trained and spaced
1530cm (612in) apart on either side,
allowing a gap of 60cm (24in) in the
centre, leaving the top wire free for
the successive new canes; these are
loosely bundled up in the centre and
along the top wire until fruiting canes Plants will grow
have completed cropping. After fruiting, on post and wire
old canes are removed and new canes tied supports.
in 1530cm (612in) apart on either side, as
before. Tie these in using soft twine or thin tube tie.
Surplus canes are removed at their bases. Where space is
limited, training over an arch also works well.
Growing needs
Fertile well-drained soil of pH 6.5. Improve drainage on
Loganberries are still popular and worth growing today
and were included in a recent three-year RHS Plant Trial
that ended in 2015. The original tayberry (Rubus Tayberry
Group) was produced from a similar cross made at the
Scottish Crop Research Institute (now the James Hutton
Institute) in the 1970s by Derek Jennings, from black
berry Aurora and an improved tetraploid raspberry
(with cells having twice as many chromosomes than
normal, meaning plants often have more vigour and
better crop yields). There are now several selections
including thornless tayberry Buckingham although
this did not perform well in the trial.
Fan-trained trial
plant before pruning.
Blackberries have also undergone great improvements
through breeding: there are now many good quality,
thornless selections. Early ripening selections have
lengthened the season, and cultivated blackberries often
have different flavours to wild fruits (although these also
vary). Most blackberries and hybrid berries are floricane
types, producing fruit on laterals from canes produced
the previous year; recent breeding has also produced
primocane types. These (as with primocane or autumn-
fruiting raspberries) produce fruit on the current seasons
canes, which offers a significant advantage in ease of
training as they can be easily supported between parallel
wires. The first of these are now available, such as Reuben
4 and there will probably be even better cultivars to follow.
Selections to choose
Three selections earned an agm after the RHS Plant Trial:
Blackberry Loch Ness 8 : a well-known, thornless
cultivar of moderate vigour with good flavour if fruit
picked when fully ripe (not when it has first turned black).
Blackberry Loch Tay 6 : one of the best flavoured in
the trial with fruit similarly sized to wild blackberries. Of
moderate vigour and thornless, it is easy to train and has
grown well over an arch at RHS Garden Wisley for years.
Tayberry Group: a well-known, early ripening red

heavy soils and moisture retention on dry soils by digging
in well-rotted manure or compost.
Soil should be free of perennial weeds.
Shelter from strong winds.
Mulch with well-rotted garden compost or manure
to help moisture retention.
Apply fertiliser annually in spring; use a general fertiliser
such as growmore at 70g per sq m (2oz per sq yd).
Pests: aphids are often present but not always enough to
be a problem and may be controlled by predators. Spray
with an approved pesticide if necessary but not when in
flower. Raspberry beetle larvae can be found in
fruit: if numbers are high, control with a
product containing natural pyrethrum.
Raspberry leaf and bud mite can cause
yellow blotches on leaves and red berry
mite can stop fruit ripening. Both were
controlled in the trial using predatory
mite Ambylesius cucumeris.
Diseases: purple blotch, raspberry cane
spot and spur blight can be a problem.
horizontal wires.
Good training of canes to allow for air
movement, and removal of the old canes after
fruiting help minimise problems. Soil-borne
diseases verticillium wilt and Phytophthora root rots
may occur in soils with poor drainage.
Disorders: magnesium deficiency can show up as
interveinal yellowing of the leaves. This can be corrected
with foliar sprays of magnesium sulphate (Epsom salts).
Marianne Majerus
Blackberry Karaka Black
berry. It has a trailing habit of moderate vigour, has small
Blackberries will produces good crops of thorns and is easily trained. Good fresh and cooked.
long, tasty fruit early in
grow attractively
over an arch. 8 the season.
Other non-agm cultivars worth growing included:
Blackberry Karaka Black: an early cultivar with long,
Tayberries produce blunt-ended fruits of excellent flavour. It has thorny canes
early crops of red
fruit and are quite of low vigour so does not need much space. Although some
easily trained on plants in the trial died, it has grown well on other sites.
fences or walls. Blackberry Navaho 3 : has thornless, upright canes
and large flowers of ornamental value. It crops from late
Pruning and July to November in some years. Fruit size is variable and
typing in. of good flavour. Some of the cropping is on primocanes.
Blackberry Helen 1 : one of the least vigorous, most
compact cultivars. Suitable for smaller spaces.
Loganberry 7 : the entry in the trial was a thornless clone
and it performed well. It would have been reconfirmed as
an agm but the clone name could not be ascertained. It
cropped well and is of good flavour, picked fully ripe.
The highest yields in the trial were achieved by
Tie canes to
blackberry cultivars Asterina, Caanska Bestrna and
Chester. All are vigorous and fruited in late November at
Wisley; much of this fruit will not ripen in cooler areas.
Primocane blackberries are a promising development;
Reuben had good flavour but needs an early season and a
warm autumn to crop well; it does not ripen many fruit
most summers. I look forward to growing earlier cropping
primocane cultivars in future as they become available.
Marianne Majerus

Hybrid berries can offer heavy crops of luscious fruit

Leave the centre
RHS website For further information, search from often thornless plants, which usually ripen earlier
clear for new canes.
Growing blackberries at www.rhs.org.uk than wild brambles. Wall- or fence-trained they can make
well-behaved, productive and attractive garden plants.

64 The Garden | August 2016 August 2016 | The Garden 65