Every modern gardener is familiar with such a unique plant as a blackberry. The large berry of the Pink family is distinguished by a dark color, a rather sweet and aromatic taste. In addition, blackberries, the care of which is quite simple, have a large number of useful properties and substances that help in the fight against various diseases that occur in the winter, such as colds and tuberculosis. These arguments are enough to spend the necessary amount of time to care for the blackberry, which in response to the efforts made will bring juicy and tasty fruits.
Features of plant care
Blackberries belong to a number of plants that do not require frequent watering and tolerate drought well, however, during flowering and ripening of the fruit, the berry should be watered as often as possible. In order to retain moisture as long as possible, mulch is placed at the base of the bush.
Caring for blackberries in autumn and winter requires mineral and organic fertilizing, as well as various fertilizers. The soil must always be maintained in a loosened state, and weed removal under the bush should be carried out regularly. The plant is of two types: with thorns and without. Thorny varieties are highly frost-resistant, but their springless analogue is subject to freezing and often does not tolerate high frosts in Russia. To prevent freezing of the bushes and to ensure proper care of the blackberry in the fall, they resort to various kinds of measures to help keep the bush unscathed.
Planting a blackberry
In order to increase the frost-resistant properties, the berry should be planted in the spring. It is better to plant a blackberry in places well consecrated and protected from strong winds. The soil can be completely different, but the most favorable is the land with the content of humus. Groundwater located under the bush should not reach more than 1-1.5 m from the surface of the earth. Young shoots of the plant can be either creeping or upright, so care for blackberries in the fall is carried out depending on the type of plant. The first and second are characterized by a 2-year development cycle: in the first half, the blackberry grows tall, and in the second growth goes wide, and branches appear on the shoots, on which fruits will form in the future.
Blackberry pruning in the fall
This is a fairly serious procedure, since it directly depends on whether the plant will bear fruit in the next year, and whether it will recover at all after winter frosts.
To prevent the plant from freezing, it is necessary to ensure the correct pruning and care of the blackberry in the fall. Pruning begins in August, immediately after the plant has set off and begins to dry. Regardless of the period of ripening and fruiting in different bushes in the summer cottage, they are cut and prepared for winter in late September. Last year’s old shoots are removed at the very root to prevent the development of a variety of bacteria and pests in them. Along with these procedures, you can do the following - cut off the young growth, as well as pinch off the shoots that appeared in the spring of this year. This is done so that high shoots (1.5-2 m) cease to grow upward and retain strength for lateral shoots. Blackberry, the care of which provides a lot of trouble, is difficult to prune.
The most difficult task is working with its prickly branches. To handle them, use tight gloves to protect your hands from scratches. All diseased, dry and weak branches are cut and burned. When planting new seedlings, they are immediately cut off (at an altitude of 25-30 cm from the ground), which makes it possible to develop new shoots. Next to the bush, a trellis is immediately installed, on which branches and processes of the plant can lie. A healthy bush should consist of no more than 7-8 fruiting branches. In the case when the shoots grow in height more than 1–1.3 m, they are shortened by 10-15 cm. Cutting the blackberry increases the yield and frost resistance of the plant. Cuttings of blackberries are also made in the fall. It should be noted that only upright plant varieties can be divided into root cuttings. All of the above facts will help to plan and organize the necessary care for the blackberry in the fall, which should be trimmed efficiently and on time.
Winter preparations
Due to its increased sensitivity to winter frosts, the plant still has not gained wide popularity and distribution among gardeners and summer residents. Of the more than 200 species of blackberries, hardly a dozen are popular. That is why special care is needed for blackberries in the fall. It includes a careful choice of planting location, growing conditions and proper preparation for winter, starting in the summer.
Shelter plants for the winter
Caring for a blackberry in the fall begins with preparing the plant for wintering, providing it with all the necessary conditions. At a temperature equal to 10-18 degrees, the blackberry should be covered for the winter, using a variety of methods and methods known to the people.
For example, after all the shoots are trimmed and stacked, they can be insulated with corn leaves and a plastic film. Blackberry branches inclined to the ground for styling and warming often break. To prevent this, a load is attached at the base of the plant since the summer, gradually tilting the process to the ground. Thus, by autumn, the plant independently forms a slope. In addition to corn leaves, as insulation, you can use dry leaves, tops, straw, ruberoid, sawdust and manure, allowing you to save the plant throughout the winter. With the advent of spring, the bush is freed from warming materials, dead stems are removed, and healthy shoots are attached to the trellis. Shelter for the winter and care for blackberries in the fall in the suburbs does not require much effort.
Pests and Diseases: Precautions
In the process of growth and fruiting, the plant is repeatedly attacked by various ticks, goldfish and other undesirable companions. For example, a blackberry gall mite, no larger than 0.2 mm in size, hibernates on the bush, and in spring it moves to the flowers of the plant, settling there before the appearance of the fruit.
The insect spreads with the help of wind and other insects, sucking the juice from the leaves of the plant and leaving red bulges - galls on them. In order to fight after harvest, fruitful shoots are completely cut and destroyed. After the shoots are cut, the place is sprayed with a solution of garlic, laundry soap and feverfew. To prevent relapse in the spring of next year, the bush is treated with the same solution. Zlatka is a bug laying eggs on the bark of shoots. The insect gnaws the moves in the stems, after which the shoots dry up and die. They destroy insects with the help of various sprayers and by mechanical shaking from bushes.
Conclusion
In conclusion, it is worth noting that careful care and timely shelter of the blackberry for the winter will not keep you waiting long, and at the first opportunity will delight the owners with juicy, tasty and fragrant berries.
To clarify some special points, you can look into the encyclopedia of garden plants, which widely reveals the features, pruning, planting and care of blackberries in the fall. Photos indicating the sequence of work performed will help to cope with any task that arises in the process of caring for the plant.