That is what raspberries do I do not use plastic or fabric mulch.

Raspberries are bi-annual plants, the canes coming out of the ground now will produce your berries next year and the canes already full grown this year produce berries this year. and then die off and will need pruned out later in the season. It's continuous process, year after year and what you're doing is suppressing growth for next year.

Remove the plastic, it's not something you want to use under raspberries and grow them like a hedge.

imo ...never use plastic in your garden .. period

yes.. i know.. some farmer do what you did .. but i still dont like it .. they are farmers .. they do things differently ... probably to heat the soil earlier in the season... to get things growing faster ... good for them.. but i still dont approve.. lol ..

im being kind of judgemental this morning.. whats that all about.. lol ...

ken

So it looks like I should cut the plastic and use the leaf mulch and thin if they get to thick since I've read the humidity is bad on raspberries.

I just didn't know if the leaf/grass mulch is good to use or if it could lead to rot or mold?

Raspberries are a running rooted cane plant, not a stand-alone shrub such as a blueberry. New canes will come up beside the old ones and you need to leave them. They’re next year’s fruiting canes. Before long they’ll be coming up in the lawn too but just mow them off. Remove all the plastic. Mulch with the leaves. You can cutdown any cane which has finished fruiting,

Ken, I've never used plastic but this year I purchased rolls of weaved plastic ground cover to use under my tomatoes and peppers. I'll have 5 rows 50' long and and frankly I'm getting old and want to reduce the time of managing row cover and weed control. There is a time and place to use it and will also be using ground cover under my eight 60' rows of cucurbit crops. Please allow exceptions to the "period" and understand the 1/2 acre I could hoe out in half a day 10 years ago now takes me half a week and I'm starting to lose control.

The ground cover used by the original poster could be placed to the sides covered with mulch and giving the raspberry plants 2 1/2' to 3' space in the center row and just covered with mulch so the new canes could come up. It would of looked sweet, clean and productive for 15 to 20 years as long as the old two year canes were pruned out at the end of the year.

Me too.

Steve

The plants are not biennial the individual canes are effectively biennial, as in deteriorating after fruiting. But there are two different growth modes within that general pattern: the conventional mode where a new cane grows its main stem the first year, then produces side branches that flower and fruit the second year. After which it can be removed.

And then there is the second, so called everbearing mode where the first year canes go ahead and produce flowering side branches in the upper part of the cane that first year. Followed the second year by additional side branches appearing and another round of fruiting taking place.

'Heritage' is the flagship cultivar for those kinds that fall within the everbearing category. With it having been suggested that this one is sufficiently vigorous that if the second year crop is not needed 'Heritage' can even be managed by mowing it off with a lawn mower set on high each autumn. Thereby making trellising and selective pruning unnecessary.

I cut the 2 ft opening along the other rows and filled in with the leaf mulch I was basically using the plastic this year while my leaf mulch had time to break down where I was going to use it next spring but I guess it might be better to use it now and thin out any excessive canes to allow good air flow between the plants.

So all of my raspberry rows look like the first photo above now.

this actually worked out better than I thought the silt fence is actually helping to hold the mulch in.

I mentioned above that any canes which come up in the lawn can be mown. I’ve grown raspberries for decades and would never be without them. They’re not particularly thorny, just a bit bristly, and have very few problems.

I'm definitely keeping them, I have 11 different types to see which will set fruit next year. People say that Dorman Red might be the only 1 to fruit but figured I would try some others since I have the space. Florida zone 8B, we got about 600 chill hours last winter but can be as low as 350.

looking good)

Looking real nice!!!