How to prepare blackberries for winter
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Blackberry leaves few people indifferent, most gardeners have tender feelings for these large, beautiful, fragrant and healthy berries. But with the onset of autumn, after the harvest is harvested and processed into compotes, preserves, jams, and partially frozen in the freezer for winter use, it's time to take care of the plant and prepare it for winter. Indeed, not only the health of the plant, but also the harvest for the next year depends on how your blackberry overwinters. Therefore, it is worthwhile to think in advance about fertilizers, choose material for mulching and shelter - all these steps are the preparation of blackberries for winter.
In this article, we will try to answer the questions about how necessary a shelter is for blackberries, and especially for winter-hardy varieties, how to prepare a plant, what materials will provide the most effective shelter and protect your blackberry from frost. Such moments often bother inexperienced novice gardeners who still doubt the effectiveness of certain methods and are trying to collect as much information as possible on a topic of interest to them. And perhaps experienced summer residents will find something new and interesting in this article.
In any case, we hope that with proper preparation of the plant and competent shelter with suitable materials, your blackberry will overwinter well and remain strong and healthy, continuing to delight you with a wonderful harvest.
Preparing blackberries for winter in autumn - preparatory work
Preparing blackberries for winter is the work that you have to carry out before the onset of cold weather, is nothing new, it is watering, feeding, pruning and mulching.
If the autumn is rather dry and there is very little rainfall, then the blackberry is a must water, albeit not very plentiful, but quite regularly. The plant spent a lot of energy during the fruiting period, and these forces must not only be restored, but also accumulated for future use, since they will be required in the process of laying flower buds, which means that fruiting for the next year depends on caring for blackberries in the fall. Accordingly, if the weather is rainy in the autumn, then you don't have to worry about additional watering.
Taking on pruning, you must understand that in the end there should be no more than eight branches on the bush. First of all, remove old sprouted shoots, as well as young growth, which only thickens the bush. Leave the strongest branches, which should be shortened by 20-30 cm. All cut off shoots are considered plant residues, therefore, they should not be thrown away, but burned so as not to promote the spread of harmful insects and any diseases.
Then loosen up soil around the bush, using a hoe or small spatula, and be careful not to damage the roots. In the process of loosening, remove all weeds, debris and various larvae (if any).
Add potassium-phosphorus to the kidney fertilizers, which will help the plant survive the winter better. And then mulch the soil around the blackberry using the selected material (coniferous litter, sunflower husk, spruce branches, sawdust).
The lower the air temperature drops, the less flexible the blackberry shoots become, so you need to start pulling them to the ground in advance, so as not to break the branches later. If the shoots are flexible enough, then after removing them from the support, gently bend and secure them along the lower support.
If you cannot immediately lay the branches, then collect them in a bunch and gradually bend them to the ground (they will bend in the manner of a bow for shooting), acting very carefully and gradually shortening the "bowstring".
Best time to hide blackberry bushes.
The climate in our country is extremely diverse, so it is impossible to indicate the exact dates for the shelter of the blackberry. As a rule, covering work is carried out when a constant temperature of about -5 degrees is established and at the same time dry weather lasts for several days. For blackberries, frosts below -17 degrees are dangerous; at this temperature, its shoots become fragile and can not only freeze out, but also break. No less dangerous are sudden temperature changes, when frost and thaw can occur within one day. It is very important not to be late for cover, but it is also important not to
hurry up, because at the moments of thaw, the blackberry bushes will begin to rot in the warmth, and this threatens the spread of various types of rot and mold, which will ultimately lead to the death of the plant. And all the condensate that appears in warm weather will freeze with the onset of frost, covering the plant with an ice crust.
Garden blackberry, preparation for winter. Various options for covering material
What materials can be used to hide a blackberry? In this case, the choice is quite rich: you can use improvised means, the remnants of building materials or special covering materials. Although a combination of different materials is the best option, this will provide more protection for your plants.
Improvised means
First of all, one can use land - This is the most affordable material that guarantees good cover. Problems can arise in the spring, when you have to get thorny bushes out of the ground, in this case, as a safety measure, you must use thick gloves or mittens so as not to injure your hands.
Another free and readily available shelter material is snow, but there are also some disadvantages. With temperature changes, the snow melts and freezes again, covering the covered plant with an ice crust, and this is extremely undesirable and rather dangerous.
Another type of material that is suitable for hiding blackberries is hay. It is necessary to prepare such material throughout the summer, collecting and drying vegetable tops, weeds or corn leaves (tough and almost waterproof - they are one of the best covering materials).
It is important that all the grass is free from signs of disease or harmful insects, as well as free seeds that can ripen and spread weeds. It should also be borne in mind that in such a warm and easily passable shelter, mice can settle, which can ruin the blackberry shoots. Therefore, when using hay or straw, you must take care of poisonous baits against rodents in advance.
Another great covering material is spruce branches. Branches of a pine tree or a Christmas tree will not only provide the plant with warmth, but also scare away mice and harmful insects with their rather strong smell. If we add to this the fact that they perfectly pass moisture and air, then we can conclude that spruce branches are the best material for sheltering any plants.
For sheltering plants for the winter, they are often used burlap. But it is recommended to do this in combination with other materials, since burlap itself, although a breathable material, is not warm enough.
Sawdust it is not recommended to use it for shelter, since this material absorbs water well, turning into a wooden block of ice in frost, which ultimately will not lead to the protection of the plant, but to its death.
Remains of building materials
Often, leftovers are used to shelter plants. linoleum or roofing material. These materials protect plants well from frost, it is not difficult to build a shelter out of them, but in severe frosts they become rather fragile and most likely it will not work to reuse them.
Felt or sintepon can be used only if you are sure of stable frosty weather throughout the winter, since during a thaw such material will become saturated with moisture and pose a danger to the blackberry bushes covered by it.
Before the day of winter shelter, dense plastic wrap, but now gardeners are increasingly abandoning this material, since with frequent temperature changes in winter, the covered plants do not breathe at all and die under a layer of film.
Special covering materials
Now a large number of nonwovens are being produced, otherwise called geotextiles: lutrasil, spandbond, agrotex. All of them perfectly retain heat, while allowing both moisture and air to pass through, and therefore they can be used at any temperature, without fear of condensation and overheating of plants during thaw and icing when the air temperature drops.
In addition to geotextiles, you can use foam, which also provides warmth, but, as with hay, you have to worry about rodents. Materials such as polystyrene and geotextiles can be used for more than one year, and with their help a rather large area of the garden can be protected, the only problem is that they are quite expensive.
Preparing blackberries for winter - covering the plant
After you have completed all the autumn plant care activities (pruning, feeding and mulching) and pulled its branches to the ground, you can start building a shelter. By the way, if the branches are flexible enough and it turned out to bend them to the ground itself, then the blackberries should not be laid on the soil, but on a previously prepared wooden flooring.
If the branches could only be bent into an arc, then you will have to build a frame around them (you can use slate sheets, plywood, boards), and only then use the covering material. Installing a frame and using different types of covering material will help provide more reliable protection for your plants, the most effective will be a combination of spruce branches and geotextiles.
When choosing a nonwoven fabric, you need to focus on a white material (this is an axiom: we use black geotextiles in summer, and white in winter). A canvas with a density of 100 grams per square meter can be used in one layer, and a less dense material is used in two layers.
Both the plant and the largest area of the trunk circle should be covered. When using geotextiles, it must be fixed at the edges with stones, boards, earth or staples stuck into the ground.
Without such a fixation, in gusts of strong wind, your blackberries may be left without shelter. Over time, throw more snow on the structure, which will provide warmth and fix the structure.
Frost-resistant varieties - to cover or not?
Among different types of plants, there are thermophilic and frost-resistant varieties, blackberry is no exception. In this regard, the question arises: is it necessary to wrap up frost-resistant varieties of blackberries in the same way for the winter period, or is it possible not to worry about them in frosts?
If the description of the variety indicates that it is frost-resistant, this only means that it will not die in winter without shelter. But the shoots may well partially freeze out, which means that you can not dream of a rich harvest.
The second example is in the cold regions of our country, where winters are consistently harsh, only frost-resistant varieties of blackberries are recommended for planting, because they will be able to endure such a winter with a timely and well-arranged shelter - no variety will survive there without shelter.
So preparation of blackberries for winter is necessary, any varieties should be covered, this is the only way to count on a good harvest.
The most famous frost-resistant varieties include Agave, Giganta and Black Thornless. They are able to withstand frosts down to -18 ... -20 degrees without shelter without significant consequences. However, any experienced gardener will advise you not to experiment and provide the blackberries with shelter in time. This grateful plant always responds to care and good care, so with a little effort, you can enjoy delicious and healthy berries every year.