This 38-page Farmer’s Bulletin from 1948 is an excellent how-to resource for anyone who wants to learn all about growing raspberries, either on a small scale or large.
It’s also a good resource for anyone who, like me, already does grow raspberries. I’ve had two rows of red raspberry canes on the edge of my garden for may years, and they are something special!
I carefully prune and train my canes using the “linear system” (as this book calls it). But I believe the “hill system” would be a much easier way to prune and maintain a home-scale planting (I never knew about the hill system when I planted my raspberry canes).
Even though I’ve had raspberries for years, and I’ve read numerous articles about growing raspberries, this bulletin had some things to teach me. In particular, I learned two new training techniques for the linear system that I never knew before. And I learned about a homemade cane-cutter tool that the old-timers used to prune out old canes.
Contents of this book include…
Conditions necessary for raspberry growing
Preparation of the soil
Obtaining and handling the stock
Planting
Cultivation
Summer thinning
Training and pruning
Winter protection
Harvesting
Price: $1.99
P.S. One thing the old agriphemera writings lack is color. The picture below shows me picking some of my own fresh raspberries. Plant them once, take proper care of them, and your raspberries will yield a delicious crop every year, for many years to come. I've found Nourse Farms to be an excellent online source of berry plants.
1 comment:
Your raspberries are beautiful, Herrick! Our daughter grows raspberries in the hill method, up in Redmond, Oregon. But, I'm sure this pamphlet will be useful to her and to my raspberry-garden-to-be in spring 2016. Thanks for offering this.
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