Sunday 3 March 2013

Pruning Autumn Raspberries

The weather has been beautiful up here in the South Lakes. It hasn't rained for at least 2 whole weeks (the first extended run of dry weather since 2011) and on a couple of days it has been quite warm - according  to my car we hit the heady heights of 12C on one day last week. I have a deadline to meet at the moment so am a little busy, however I have managed to squeeze in a couple of quick trips to the plot. 

After watering the seeds I have been sowing over the last couple of weeks, the first job on my list was to prune the, very prickly, autumn raspberries...

Autumn Raspberries Before Pruning
Before...

Autumn Raspberries After Pruning
After!

The Royal Horticultural Society recommends cutting Autumn raspberries down to the ground in February, well I just managed it, pruning mine on the 28th. As you can see it looks a lot tidier. As well as cutting them back I also put a layer of compost on the top. I was pleased to see lots of new canes poking out of the ground (below). These plants didn't bear much fruit last year, I am hoping they will be a little more generous this year.

While pruning I was pretty amazed to see a Painted Lady (Vanessa cardui) butterfly fluttering around the plot. 

New Growth on Autumn Raspberries
Green Shoots - New Canes Appearing on the Autumn Raspberries

2 comments:

  1. Well done, and I hope that they do well this year.
    I presume that the Painted Lady hibernated here over the winter as they're usually a migrant. Flighty xx

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  2. A good job well done - I hardly had any raspberries at all last year - first time ever. I missed them as I love to have them on top of cereal for breakfast. Lets hope we do a bit better this year.

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