I have an extensive post for 2015 in another thread, but I'll add a summary here. Very cold winter in 2014 / 2015 (-12F) which ended up killing all of the canes for all but the covered Western trailing blackberries. Newberry seems to be a good mix of productive, vigorous growers, and has good flavor. It is thorny though. Columbia Star didn't produce anything, where as Newberry produced a lot of berries. Marion is still the best-flavored blackberry I grow. Boysen and Siskiyou struggled to produce much. Kotata produced a decent amount but their berries have average flavor in my location. PrimeArk45 didn't produce well because 2015 was also very wet which seems to have impacted it's growth. Prime Ark Freedom was planted late in the year so I'll have more berried to test this year. Loch Ness should be ready to fruit in 2016 along with Tayberry.

My raspberries did really well despite the cold. Cascade Delight was a superstar producer. It's a winner variety and took the cold despite it being a PNW variety. My black raspberries (Jewel and Mac Black) finally produced a decent amount too. Royalty (purple) did well and Glencoe (purple) did OK.

For 2016:

- Adding Olallie, more Cascade Delight, more Tayberry, more Osage, Natchez, Sweetie Pie, Schultz, and Von. Also have several open-pollenated hybrids that I'm going to plant. I have more planting space since removing all of my grapevines.

- Reducing Siskiyou (difficult to manage because of stiff canes that break easily). I may also reduce Boysen and Columbia Star if they fail to produce well this year, given this winter has been much milder than last two years.

Cane borers were really bad last year, so I'm going to have to spray the trailing blackberries. Japanese beetles and stink bugs moderately bad last year but SWD was actually very light.

Thornless boysenberries are excellent and very easy here in So Cal:

Where did you buy the Sweetcrisp blueberry?

Raspberry plants have a difficult time surviving the hot dry summers in Southern California. I found that planting them in partial shade helps, as well as making sure they receive consistent watering (2-3 times a week, but more often is better) during the Summer. In Southern California, raspberries prefer morning sun.

Canby Red seems to survive a little better than others. Willamette is vigorous growing, but as soon as Summer comes rolling around its leaves start to dry out and wither, fruit set not so good here.

Just got hold of Bababerry. It's still too early to tell, but the leaves on Bababerry seem to be a little bit more leathery than other raspberry varieties. Probably an adaptation to the drier climate.

Jay - How much and where do you tip the blueberries? - I have a bunch of varieties, in pots, 3rd year now I think. Great blooms so far. I need to split them, probably this fall.

Pot 1: Jubilee- Misty- Sunshine, one of which died. Not sure which.

Pot 2: Sharpblue + Springwide or Springhigh (I forget) and

Pot 3: Southmoon.

In 2015 I planted 1 each of these four:

olallieberry, marionberry boysenberry (thorns), bababerry.

All survived, none are very big. Will see how fruit is. The boysenberry sent it's runners underground and will spread next year, I believe. I will try Nantahala, Freedom and Vintage due to your great experience Jay. I'm S23 - if you are S21, that's not far off.

I'd love to see some photos of your plants and how you are supporting them. What kind of spacing are you using?

I'm not feeding - just giving compost and spraying with AACT compst tea.

I'd also like to know where to get sweetcrisp around here.

I had great success with heritage last year. I grew it in a 2x2 foot pot. Zone 24. Only got fall fruit but new canes kept coming so i had a half pint of berries every week.

Went to Indiana and picked up Caroline, vintage and Nantahala. Also got good ole heritage, fall gold and anne, all from peaceful valley but anne from parks. Hoping to get a summer crop this year.

i have Marion and boysenberry in 5 gallon pots. The marion is doing great nicely leaved 15 foot cane in full sun is drought tolerant. I grow the cane in a circle around my Windows to deter crimes. The boysenberry needs daily water and only grew to 8 foot long. But it is growing three new canes in the pot. I think if i put it in a 25 gallon it would be a easy plant.

i grew sunshine blue, misty, and O'Neal last year. The birds got most of the fruit. they're so cute it was worth it. Have you ever seen a bird smile. Put a pot with a blueberry, sunflower and dreadlock amaranth in front of your window. When that swallow came down to inspect my blueberry plant and bite one off she got the biggest smile on her face.

Home depot sells great sunshine blueberry cheap.

This year i added emerald, jewel and sharp.

I'm in Los Angeles, anyone getting summer crops from their raspberries around here?

Update: All my other raspberry varieties do not appear to be doing well, the Bababerry variety is the only one that has lots of leaves growing on them right now.

My sunshine blue has a moderate harvest. Last year a swallow triumphantly got one berry. Which she relished and brazenly ate while perched on the bush basking in the summer sun.

This year a swallow dives down to check the blueberries all day long. She broke off a few branches that couldn't take her weight and effectively thinned the fruit. Now she has learned to just dive close and inspect for ripeness. She's a hoot.

Just saw a pigeon moving in on the blueberry bush. These city birds don't know how to tell when blueberries are ready, they just set. Hopefully emerald will set a second crop so there's enough for us all.

Damn that is a good looking bowl of berries!

Have too agree that my Prime Ark Freedoms actually looked like they kept growing all winter here in New York, we had wacky weather this winter and new leaves were sprouting in February....as far as a required dormancy brambles do need a rest in order to cycle, but they do have varieties that can literally fruit and grow year around now.

I can't wait for berry pickin myself, some new Blackberries to enjoy this spring / summer/ fall and some new Raspberry varieties like Jaclyn, Latham, Crimson Night.

Just found out that Jaclyn which has a very complex parentage which includes Black Raspberry will put out 3 crops in a season if pruned properly...a second bonus in Fall....might have something to do with Southland, also part of Lauren's parentage.

Post some more pic's if possible peeps.

Jay Part Shade,

I'm interested in getting one or more of the Prime Ark Freedoms cultivar, did you get them in SoCal or have to order it? I'm from San Diego.

Thanks!

Jason

Hey Jason, I got mine at Indianaberry.com, their season is almost over so you should hurry to order some bare roots while they still have them :).

Jay, thanks!

I've been going back and forth with my order of prime ark freedom. These berries sure sound good. But they're sold out now; next year.

I did get vintage, natanala, Caroline, Anne, fall gold, and heritage. Even though I'm in zone 10, you'd think it was zone 7. Vintage just sprouted, Caroline, fall gold, and heritage came up too.

Barely any growth on any of them, but fall gold is setting berries.

Still waiting for natanala and anne to sprout. If these don't sprout I will buy some new ones next year, the roots were alive when I received them.

My heritage were stolen from the community garden. I grew it last year and I really like it. If Caroline or vintage are as productive as heritage I may forego It. I only get the fall crop, but heritage just keeps pushing out berries for months. The taste is just ok for fresh eating from my container garden, Thats why I decided to try planting in the community garden. Still I prefer volume to flavor. Flavor changes every year, but my belly fills on volume.

I'm not as good at berries as everyone else on here is.

My boysenberry plant looks like a forest in the pot. Hope I get berries this year. Marion had one long cane from last year, it just put out a new cane. Last year I didn't know about pinching so no laterals. Think I will pinch the new cane when it gets a foot tall. They haven't fruited yet.

The raspberries grow at a mannered pace that's easy to control. Blackberries on the otherhand seem to leap out of their pots searching for other pots to conquer. So for me blackberry must be grown in a pot near concrete so it can't excape to the wildlife.

Emerald blueberry shading peas, clover, and beans. Lettuce is going to seed.

Boysenberry and beans, varigated solomens seal in the bottom of the pot. The fall gold is growing behind the chard leaf and gets very little sun. The beans have their own trellis in the pot next to the boysenberry but next thing I knew they decided that the preferred the trellis on the boysenberry pot. Now they're climbing in the hanging basket, and then to the moon.

Marion berry is wrapped around the window first-time growing blackberry so I didn't pinch,it just has two canes. I just pinched them and got a small amount of branching. Would love to have a twenty foot long thorny branched cane.

Well its not the prettiest but I'm eating good.

Sunshine blue, and a volenteer tomato,please don't mind my spider webs, that's my only pest control besides ladybugs. I try to keep them in check, but on a rooftop berry garden is a fly eaters paradise, so they keep coming back.

Spider mites are bad right now, but they're going for beans, sunflowers and weeds. Those plants all grown so fast who cares. The white flies came and bite the pineapple weed, it was instant death. They've learn to avoid the epazote but since pineapple weed is a native and looks just like pigs lettuce it was a killing field millions of dead white flies.

FYI that tomato plant would be full of tomatoes if the local mammals weren't swiping them. I managed to get two amish paste because they filled up on every one of my super sweet pomegranates and sun ripened cherry tomatoes and then snubbed their noses at a bland paste tomato.

These little blueberry seedlings are hidden somewhere in that food forest. Sharp, misty, and the ?. Only three inches tall, misty lost all her leaves but everyone else is growing well. Gotta get some peat and surround those tiny little roots. I think misty wants more sun, but at two inches in overcast may, it ain't going to happen. If she were a foot tall it would be better. June gloom is coming so I won't have sun until July. Hang in there Misty!

'Bababerry' looks to be a winner here, even in its first year:

The berries are very crumbly, and the amount of flavor so-so, but Bababerry does appear to be very vigorous and better able to tolerate dry conditions. The berry size is medium to large, so that's a plus. I've seen pictures of some big Baba berries, so apparently they can get quite big. Maybe not quite as big as the "Jilin Giant Raspberry" though, lol

One of the reasons these raspberries can get so big is that they're not really the same raspberry species. It is thought that Bababerry may be a hybrid between Rubus idaeus and Rubus Glaucifolius, while the Jilin Raspberry ('Fengmanhong' in China) is likely a tetraploid of Rubus parvifolius.

Some of you might also want to check out the Mysore raspberry (Rubus niveus) and the Taiwan raspberry (Rubus pentalobus), both of which grow extremely well in the hot dry climate of Southern California but the berry quality of these two are very much inferior (they can make a good edible ornamental though).

There are also Black Raspberries (Rubus occidentalis, native to the Eastern part of America) that are a little more hardy in hot dry conditions than regular raspberries, but they still don't grow the best in zone 10. The flavor of black raspberries is different from red raspberries, however. If you like blackberries you will probably like black raspberries too, and like blackberry the canes are covered in little thorns and the bush doesn't tend to spread out much through underground runners.

Can someone tell me the difference between vintage and natahala?

My vintage bareroot are growing but the natahala didn't come up. So I'm curious to hear from people that are growing both. Which has a longer harvest season, taste, textures. Do you get a florocane harvest in zone 9?

Is anyone growing Ponca (Sweet-Ark™' CV.) blackberry or BP-1 raspberry? It seems like each year one of the university ag departments comes up with a "bigger and better" variety. I wonder how they would do in SoCal.