Any beginning gardener will sooner or later be interested in how to cut raspberries in the fall and why this is necessary. First you need to find out: what is it like. Raspberry is a shrub that consists of two parts: aboveground and underground. Every year he throws out new shoots with the help of near-root buds. Fruiting is carried out in the second year after the start of growth with the help of flower buds.
Do I need to prune raspberries in the fall
This procedure with a shrub is usually carried out in early September, immediately after it finishes bearing fruit. During pruning, the gardener takes away all the shoots that the bushes gave this year, as well as damaged and broken branches.
This procedure is necessary for raspberries for intensive growth and abundant fruiting. Without it, the bush grows very much, it begins to lack light and air and, as a result, it begins to bring small and tasteless berries. To ensure optimal growth conditions, approximately eight to twelve shoots per meter should be left. Remote branches are best burned, as they can be carriers of various parasites and fungal diseases.
How to prune raspberries
In autumn, this process is carried out for better development of the branches of the shrub, but pruning can also be used to increase its productivity. This procedure is carried out in early spring. In its process, a shortening of the tops of raspberry shoots is made by about fifteen centimeters. This allows you to greatly slow down their development and direct the flow of enzymes and nutrients to where the gardener needs it, namely: to the kidneys. This approach makes it possible to get a huge harvest by mid-summer.
How to prune raspberries in the fall
The process of cutting raspberries is very simple. It is necessary to completely remove all damaged, diseased or sterilized shoots. In the future, they will only harm the plant, and their destruction will have a beneficial effect on its development. Cut them as close to the ground as possible, without leaving even a small hemp. In addition, there is a technique that allows you to further increase the number of berries on one bush. It is called double cropping. For this, annual shoots pinch when they reach a meter long. This allows you to awaken the kidneys and get several lateral branches to the beginning of the pruning procedure. Then they are allowed to winter and at the beginning of spring they are pruned together with everyone else. This practice allows you to get the most plentiful crop.
Everyone who is interested in how to prune raspberries in the fall should understand that by reducing the number of branches, they harm the plant. All damaged shoots should be removed, but the annual branches should be left untouched.
How to get long fruiting
Anyone who wants to learn how to prune raspberries in the fall and get an extra crop will be interested in the technique in which this shrub produces fruit for two months. To do this, during spring pruning, all two-year-old shoots are conditionally divided into three groups:
- the first is cut off by twelve to fifteen centimeters;
- the second is cut in half;
- on the third leave about fifteen centimeters of length.
A similar approach allows you to get a long harvest period: from the tenth of July to the first of September.