Introduction: Cultivating Black Berry Plants

About: Neo-Renaissance Man

In my back yard i found a bunch of blackberry's so i decided i should cultivate them and see how many berry's i could grow



Step 1: TOOLS NEEDED

just a pair of thick gloves and some plant clippers. Oh and a bunch of black berry plants

Step 2: Life Cycle of the Black Berry

Black berry's grow in 2 year cycles the roots of the plant are the main part.
 The seeds have to germinate over winter, in there first year of life they shoot up one flexible shoot. This first cane grows more like a bush then a cane. Its flexible and branches out.
At the end of its first year the first cane or the Primocane, hardens and will then produce fruit, And then you will see another cane start to grow, this is the Floricane.
  The next year the primocane will be dried out and dead, and the floricane will grow taller harden and produce berry's and then the cycle continues.

Step 3: Step One: Pruning Away the Dead Canes

 Ok so your black berry's have two canes on them they are more then two years old, One of the canes is dry and brown "dead".
  These need to be cut off they break off pretty easily. You will see a smaller shoot start growing becarefull not to destroys these little canes they are very fragile  and dont harden until they get a over a foot tall.
  your going to do this once the blackberry's have leaves, BUT before they have flowers. For me this was in  early May.
Ok now take two floricane or primocanes.

Step 4: Step Two: Securing (staking) Your Black Berry's

Ok now you got your dead canes removed, its time to "stake" your berry's.
   When the black berry's fruit the top get really heavy, they will then fall over and your berry's are now food for the bugs. To prevent this i started with tying them to stakes, this did not work once i figured out how many stakes i needed.
    Then i would take a group of canes and tie them with some rope so that all of the canes, would support them self's and not fall over.
BUT THEN! i realized you didn't need the rope at all. You can just twist them together and they stick. This works very well and requires only the plants them selves.
 These will be from two different plants, since you remove the dead ones. Most of the black berry's growing in my yard grew in small groups of 2 -3 different roots. So this made it easy to twist 2 -4 canes into one bunch.
   Take the two canes start to twist them together about a foot from the ground. They then stick together with there thorns.
  The more plants you twist together the less likely it will not fall over or break in a storm.
  Check out my other instructable to make these into jelly

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