# I'm starting to dream about Blackberries!!



## myakkagldwngr (May 30, 2010)

Should I be worried???
Last year I made 5 gallons of BB wine and loved it. Told myself I had to make at least 10 this year.
I have picked so many blackberries lately that I am really having dreams about picking blackberries!
Picked more with my brother yesterday evening, probably 25 pounds.
So far I have 20 gallons in secondaries, 5 gallons in a primary, and probably 40 pounds more in the freezer.
If I keep going like I have been, I look to end up with maybe 40 gallons of wine and all the berries I need for F-pacs.
Thing that scares me the most, is that Elderberry season is just around the corner.


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## Wade E (May 30, 2010)

Yep, you have a problem just like us except that some of us cant find the berries like that and live vicariously through you.


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## ashappar (May 30, 2010)

its about a month till blackberries ripen around here, but I've been scouting locations for picking since flowers started. red raspberries I'm picking now, and the black raspberries are really close. I think I'll need to build a winerack for all the 2010 berry wines, or at least I hope. 

Seems like this is a better than average year for berries. 

I haven't found any elderberries though.


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## Runningwolf (May 30, 2010)

Yep your obbsessed! You need to get help and soon. Think any of your neighbors will help you with making it for a few bottles..LOL.


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## Wade E (May 30, 2010)

The berries are just starting to form as cute little babies over here!


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## Sacalait (May 30, 2010)

We picked our last batch today, ours are finished. The wife got her 2gals. for the freezer today and the rest went to the steam juicer. I'm ending the season with 5.75gals of juice for the year. I'm happy about it, splinters and all.


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## Wade E (May 30, 2010)

Thats a nice haul!


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## ashappar (May 31, 2010)

absolutely! almost 6 gals of steamed juice is a nice haul.

how many pounds of blackberries did you steam to get that much juice?
are you canning it or are you going to use it now?

the choices of wild blackberries around here are what looks like Illini Hardy (thorny,vigorous,mostly upright) they survive every type of winter no matter how hard, so they thrive on their own in rural areas when birds drop seed. I've found patches as large as 1 to 1 1/2 acre this year.

wild raspberries around here look to be almost 100% black ones, the rounded largish fruit that look like the Black Hawk variety. In wild patches, the dead brambles make picking tedious since you have to wade through them often to get to the newer stuff. 

in my home garden I opened up enough room for 2 or 3 50foot rows and next season I plan on planting some purple (Royal) and some yellow raspberries or a late crop red if I can get them before the nursery sells out. 

I've become berry obsessed since I tried my first blackberry wine, then later a red raspberry wine and a black raspberry port.


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## Tom (May 31, 2010)

myakkagldwngr said:


> Should I be worried???
> Last year I made 5 gallons of BB wine and loved it. Told myself I had to make at least 10 this year.
> I have picked so many blackberries lately that I am really having dreams about picking blackberries!
> Picked more with my brother yesterday evening, probably 25 pounds.
> ...


*OMG ! ! !* 
I'm afraid you should be worried! It seams like you picked up something. That "something" is called *"BEING OBSESSED !"*
There is NO cure for this. The only thing you can do is make MORE wine. Oh yea ya gotta starting drinking more


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## Sacalait (May 31, 2010)

ashappar said:


> absolutely! almost 6 gals of steamed juice is a nice haul.
> 
> how many pounds of blackberries did you steam to get that much juice?
> are you canning it or are you going to use it now?
> ...



Two gallons of berries yields 3/4gal of juice. Other than what the wife confiscated, they will all go for wine.
I have 5 varieties, brazos, roseborough, triple crown, chickasaw and kiowa. Kiowa is the largest and most flavorful berry I've ever seen.


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## St Allie (May 31, 2010)

Tom said:


> *OMG ! ! !*
> I'm afraid you should be worried! It seams like you picked up something. That "something" is called *"BEING OBSESSED !"*
> There is NO cure for this. The only thing you can do is make MORE wine. Oh yea ya gotta starting drinking more



that something is called "BEING BLESSED!!"

On the other side of the world.. we are watching all the leaves fall off the fruit trees.. my raspberry canes are now sticks.. and the veg garden is full of cabbages..

cabbage wine?...anyone?...

Allie


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## Julie (May 31, 2010)

St Allie said:


> that something is called "BEING BLESSED!!"
> 
> On the other side of the world.. we are watching all the leaves fall off the fruit trees.. my raspberry canes are now sticks.. and the veg garden is full of cabbages..
> 
> ...



Count me out on the cabbage wine but you should probably post a recipe on the unusual wine thread,  I bet someone would try it.

Today we put in our garden I need to buy the green beans and plant them adn then it will be done.


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## myakkagldwngr (Jun 1, 2010)

I do consider myself very lucky to have found all the berries I have. Even more so that my brother works on a very large tomato farm that has quite a bit of grown up areas. As we ride to the patch we pick, I can see berries growing almost every where there is a thick spot.
I wish I knew more of the berries life cycle and varieties.
Around my yard it's only berries that at their largest get the size of a small marble.
But out on the farm there are some the get as big as your thumb. I'm going to try to get some of those to come up from seeds.
But then I think that berries might be like grapes and only bear after a certain age?


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## ashappar (Jun 1, 2010)

it depends myakkagldwngr, some varieties will crop on first year canes and others will crop on the second year canes. 

Sacalait - nice varieties! Triple crown will make it here as long as the winters arent too hard and I'm going to plant some of those. The others I'm not sure about, Brazos and Kiowa I'm pretty sure wont survive our winters. I used to live in Louisiana for several years near Monroe. I miss the food and rural areas, water and wildlife everywhere. cheers!


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## Sacalait (Jun 1, 2010)

myakkagldwngr said:


> I do consider myself very lucky to have found all the berries I have. Even more so that my brother works on a very large tomato farm that has quite a bit of grown up areas. As we ride to the patch we pick, I can see berries growing almost every where there is a thick spot.
> I wish I knew more of the berries life cycle and varieties.
> Around my yard it's only berries that at their largest get the size of a small marble.
> But out on the farm there are some the get as big as your thumb. I'm going to try to get some of those to come up from seeds.
> But then I think that berries might be like grapes and only bear after a certain age?



Trying to growing blackberries from seeds is a waste of time. Either transplant new shoots or bury the prima canes allowing new shoots to form which can be transplanted.


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## myakkagldwngr (Jun 3, 2010)

I tried transplanting some of the better berries I found in my yard, but found they were all coming up from some central root stock and the runners I dug up were not rooted enough to survive.
After the summer heat has died down, mid Dec. here locally, I'll try again.


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## Sacalait (Jun 3, 2010)

Choose a strong looking shoot and dig it up trying to get as much of the root as possible. Place it in a large plant container with good soil and keep it in the shade and well watered. Once you've seen that it has survived wait until the fall for planting.


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## Larryh86GT (Jun 3, 2010)

I've had very good luck transplanting my raspberry suckers this year. I have an entire new 20 ft row of them started and only had one sucker not survive.


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## Mud (Jun 3, 2010)

Brambles are usually pretty hardy. Killing them on purpose can be tough. Last year I dug up a bunch transplanted in June. Not the best time, but that was when they were available. Instead of digging individuals I'd try a large patch. Minimal disturbance to the roots will help survival and you'll have less wait until the patch fills in.


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## myakkagldwngr (Jun 7, 2010)

I wish I could get some of the ones from the farm my brother works on to transplant. Those dang things are never ending it seems. 
We went again yesterday morning, that was the third picking and got another 20 pounds in about an hour and a half.
The majority of these berries are the size of a finger down to the second knuckle.
I think we might even hit them again, but that's up to him.
With what we picked yesterday, I'm pushing 200 pounds of berries.
6 five gallon batches fermenting, another 5 gallon batch in the freezer along with several gallon ziplocks for F-pacs, and I'm still picking at least 3/4 of a bag in my yard every other day.


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## Midwest Vintner (Jun 7, 2010)

St Allie said:


> that something is called "BEING BLESSED!!"
> 
> On the other side of the world.. we are watching all the leaves fall off the fruit trees.. my raspberry canes are now sticks.. and the veg garden is full of cabbages..
> 
> ...



amen. i <3 blackberries. and funny you called them "sticks" because my sister's realtor said she needed to get her sticks out of the back yard to sell her house. so now we have wild black raspberries, her blackberries and her raspberries (which she grew together and by reading supposedly not good to do). we got about 60+ plants from her. they were in bad shape due to being quickly dug up, but i'd say 50+ survived. they already are growing berries now too!!!!!!


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## ashappar (Jun 7, 2010)

congrats on your new canes!
why is it not good to grow blackberries and raspberries together?


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## Midwest Vintner (Jun 8, 2010)

ashappar said:


> congrats on your new canes!
> why is it not good to grow blackberries and raspberries together?



thanks. we've been planting many things this year. 

about the berries together, something about disease or mold. dunno. it might be mis-information on the net. cannot find the link now....i know it can't be a big deal because my sister has had them growing for 10 years with no troubles near many other plants and near a garden. our biggest problem is the poison oak all over our property.

just got the first half quart picked today. looks like the next week or two will be nice!!!


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## Runningwolf (Jun 8, 2010)

Everything I read you can grow them together. Here is a link to a good artical on growing them...

http://www.ca.uky.edu/agc/pubs/ho/ho15/ho15.pdf


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## ashappar (Jun 8, 2010)

I can say that blackberries and raspberries together is kind of inconvenient especially in the wild patches where you have to wade through blackberries to get the raspberries and get ripped to shreds in the process. raspberry canes are like tickle weeds compared to the nasty thorns on the wild blackberries.

I picked 10lbs of wild black raspberries today. got bitten by every kind of flying thing imaginable. tomorrow I'll need to get some bug spray before I go back out to pick more. looks like our blackberries will be ready in two or three weeks. lots of fruit on them now, green and filling out.


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