Rain and Raspberries

It has been a rainy day today and I am not complaining. This spring has been quite cool, barely breaking into the 80's, but it has been very dry. When it rains, I try to capture as much of the rain water in tubs and try to use it up within a couple of days. Ultimately, my goal is to try and make my own water barrels in the next coming month or two.

I also wanted to blog about the second set of raspberry plants I purchased for my garden from a reputable online nursery. These plants are Caroline raspberries, which produce red raspberries, and it is an ever bearing variety. In my previous blog about Latham raspberries, I explained what summer bearing raspberries are, but not ever bearing raspberries. Well, ever bearing raspberries have canes that will bear two crops: one in the fall (I believe on the top half) when the cane is one year old and another in the spring (I believe on the bottom half) when the cane goes into its second year. After the second year, the canes should be pruned off. Of course, the process starts all over again, but by then the raspberry plants would have suckered and created many more raspberry plants. Another interesting fact about the Caroline raspberry plant is that it is a patented plant. This means that under the law, I cannot propogate the plant to sell or even give away (BTW, patented plants aren't solely limited to raspberry plants).

Now I know the Caroline raspberry plants look like sticks in the picture, but they were sent to me dormant. Therefore, the potential warm weather and longer days will induce the plants to send out new growth. Once more, I'll keep you posted.