Soft fruit bed help

[Getoutgetout]

I’ve got a 3m by 1m bed to fill. I want to plant soft fruit bushes but struggling to decide exactly what / what varieties.

my heart initially thought gooseberries and blackcurrants but I’m not sure why as we don’t eat those! I think I’d like to eat them!

we (by which I mean the children) do eat blueberries, blackberries and raspberries but what could I fit in the space and what varieties?

I have two under 7 year olds so ideally would like something thornless. And I’m a beginner gardener with not much time.

i think I may have acid soil as have camellias and an acer doing well elsewhere in the garden. So blueberries may work but from what I’ve read they seem quite hard work and / or birds eat them?

so i think that leaves raspberries and blackberries. So what could I fit in the space? Any variety recommendations?

Thank you!

I have all those fruit bushes; however, we have blueberries in pots (not got the right soil); a raspberry bed smaller than yours (ours is about 1mx1m) & a blackberry hybrid (aka the triffid!) that we grow along our back fence.
TBH the beds are more interested in our strawberries & cherries; they do eat the blackberries but we have sooo many it doesn't matter. We have about 7-8 blueberry plants - the birds do eat them but not as much as other things & I will shoo them off if I see them eating them.
No advice on varieties I'm afraid. Our hybrid is an unknown variety; we've had the blueberries so long I can't remember what they are & the raspberries are a mishmash of both summer & autumn varieties.

I personally wouldn't plant blackberries in such a small garden as you can pick them in hedgerows for free and use the land for other fruit.

Do you like strawberries? They're easy to grow and once you've got them you've always got them as they make baby plants like crazy?

Birds are a problem with soft fruit, but netting to cover them is cheap. It needs to be fixed down properly otherwise birds and hedgehogs can get tangled in it.

Try a thornless blackberry or thornless loganberry (blackberry-raspberry cross) along the back (you’ll need a support). Then room for two bushes in front - perhaps your original idea of a gooseberry (certainly not thornless!) and a blackcurrant), and you might be able to underplant with either strawberries or alpine strawberries.

@MereDintofPandiculation thanks. Yes that’s a good idea. The bed is against a fence so I could train the blackberry against that (although it is my neighbour’s fence) and maybe a cordon gooseberry.

would blueberry bush get too high and shade out blackberry thoigg?

I’ve got strawberries in planters elsewhere. I worry about snails/slugs on the ground!

@Getoutgetout I have thornless loganberry, thornless blackberry and tayberry trained on a trellis about 2m high. No idea about blueberries, but gooseberry would only get to about 1m. But would be a bit of nuisance when you were picking low down fruit. Redcurrants are nice but top favourite for blackbirds - white currants might not meet their search criteria. Currants are thornless. You could look at Worcester berries and josta berries, which are crosses - they might be thornless.

Alpine strawberries seem a lot less susceptible to slug and bird damage. Very intense taste, good for nibbling off the plant, adding to icecream, yogurt, cereal. Also for freezing and then for adding to cereal etc.

@MereDintofPandiculation thanks. You have all 3 on the one trellis? How wide is it? I’ve got 3m width to play with so wondering how many different ones could fit.

alpine strawberries are a good shout! Thanks

Unless you really like gooseberries I'd avoid. We had 4 bushes - the thorns are vicious! Last year we lost the whole crop to sawfly & wooly aphids. We've got rid of 3 bushes & down to one. And it's tucked away in a corner so I don't encounter the thorns as much.
Blueberries don't usually get very big but it's best to have several plants of different types for cross pollination.

Oh & be aware alpine strawberries travel! We have them mixed into the strawberry bed & they pop up everywhere & send runners off into everything.

Yeah, but they're easy to remove. I just clear a patch of strawberries any time I want to plant anything but otherwise leave them as a ground cover under everything. The baby frogs like them.

Thanks both. @APurpleSquirrel im not that bothered about gooseberries so I’m not really sure why I want to grow them! I think I’ll not bother.

I think I’ll try a blackberry and autumn raspberry and maybe a couple of blueberries if I’ve got the right soil and hope for the best! And a blackcurrant if I can squeeze in.

I’ll go for the alpine strawberries too - we have lots of frogs!

If going for blueberries you need more than one. They are officially self-fertile but in reality they fruit far better in a group.

You will need lots of top dressing with ericaceous soil if you plant them in a bed, they are more picky than camellias and acers. I gave up and moved them into pots, and they’ve been much happier. I chuck netting over them from early July and that keeps most of the birds off.

@CountingCrones more than 2 do you think? Ill
test the soil first before making any decisions. I really don’t want to do pots because of the watering.

Go for 3 different varieties of blueberries if you can.

I found three a big improvement on two, and two a masive improvement on one.

I don't water the pots. That's what rain is for.

NB - I do line the terracotta pots with bin bags with a big drainage hole in, to stop evaporation from the sides drying them out.

@CountingCrones ok…thanks. I don’t think I’ve room for 3 large pots though. or at least they wouldn’t be for the bed I’m think of filling. Maybe blueberries can a be. Next year project! How big are your pots? Good tip about the bin bags. I’m in London and it can get quite dry (not this spring!) so I worry about pots

Raspberries are pretty bomb proof. They do spread by underground runners, so pop up all over, but pull out easily. Blueberries are very easy in pots. I never net anything and always have plenty. The birds don't make much of a dent.

6m? I curl the stems round in big loops. I wouldn’t try to get 2 into 3m.

@MereDintofPandiculation thanks. So maybe just one blackberry on a 3 m by 2m trellis? Do you think I could fit a raspberry or two as well? With a currant bush in front and possibly strawberries.

I'd probably go for loganberry rather than blackberry - as others have said, you can always go out and pick blackberries. But if you know you like blackberries and don't know whether you like loganberries, then go for blackberry - the cultivated ones have bigger fruits than the wild ones. You'll need more than one raspberry cane, they tend to sold in 5s which is about right. There's autumn fruiting ones too. If you're having just one bush, then you might be able to put a clump of summer raspberry one side and autumn raspberry the other. They don't need so much tying in, you might get away with not tying them in at all. Then fill the gaps with alpine strawberries.

Blackberry - every year tie the last year's canes spread out along your support. If they're too long you can either cut them off or loop them around. Any new shoots, tie them loosely in a bundle going straight upwards. After fruiting, cut off all the canes that have fruited, close to the ground. Undo your bundle of new canes and spread them out along your support, and you're good to go again.

Summer fruiting raspberries - after fruiting, cut down to the ground all the canes that have fruited.

Alpine strawberries - probably good to remove the oldest plants now and again. In the orchard, I alternate between one year removing all the ones in the centre of the bed and mulching, next year removing all the ones round the edge and not mulching (because the mulch would fall on to the paths). Elsewhere I don't bother, I leave them to their own devices.

Someone else will tell you about autumn fruiting raspberries and currants.

thanks everyone. What I’m struggling to work out is can I fit a blackberry and some autumn raspberries in the 3m x 1m space or do I need to choose raspberry or blackberry?

Well, since I said you might be able to get both summer and autumn raspberries in, you should be able to get just the autumn ones in.

Remember the blackberry will be vertical, so take up about 15cm. The raspberries will be in front.

@MereDintofPandiculation thanks! Got it!