Has anyone here grown boysenberry in cold climates (zone 6 or below)? If so, how did they yield for you and was the flavor good? I read that cold climates can hinder the yield and flavor of boysenberry so I want to see if that’s true before committing to getting it.
Plants should be available in a few days
https://www.rudysoriginal.com/bare-root-boysenberry-plant/
Our boysenberry vines have been kept in the Boysen family for nearly 100 years. My grandfather Rudy Boysen developed the boysenberry on a small farm in Napa California in 1923. Today we’re growing our Rudy’s Original boysenberries in Northern California
Probably half the weight, Marion is EXTREMELY productive, that’s one reason it’s commercially grown. However, Newberry outproduces it according to the official plant patent info. Our illustrious Krismoriah thinks it has the best taste of the blackberry raspberry hybrids as well
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Have you grown both? If boysenberry really does yield half the weight of Marion then maybe I should grow Marion instead. Can others here who have grown both chime in on the yield difference between the two?
I grew both, Marion was more productive for me. It’s also the tastiest to me, but Newberry is also excellent; Newberry has more raspberry genes than Marion and this makes them pretty distinct in flavor. Boysen went from under- to over-ripe in an instant for me, or so it seemed. My other big fave was Loganberry, it was not productive but has a distinctive flavor. All past-tense for me unfortunately, they don’t like heat and I got tired of dead or dying plants and gave up at some point. If I were to move to a cooler spot I’d put in half Marion and a fourth each of Logan and Newberry.
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How much more productive was Marionberry than Boysenberry for you? Can you remember what the average yield was in pounds for each variety? And I saw you’re in zone 7a and that’s too hot for those berries? I’m in 6b so pretty close to the limit if they can’t handle 7a.
Is there a reason you wouldn’t grow boysenberry again? Is it how they go from ripe to overripe really quickly, or is it the lower yield, or the flavor wasn’t unique/good enough?
I was hoping that the boysenberry would be productive enough to get 3 pies worth of berries per plant and that it would be distinct in flavor from my blackberries and raspberries to justify the thorns and trailing habit that make it more difficult to grow.
Sorry for all the questions. It’s rare to find someone who has grown all these varieties so I’m trying to learn all I can from you.
I never got a big yield since the plants were never very vigorous. But there were a lot more berries hanging off the Marion vines. My yard in particular is super hot since it’s a south-facing hill, I’m more like zone 8 or higher for the heat.
The main issue with Boysenberry is it was not exciting enough even on the couple that ripened well. Newberry is 10x better, that berry rocks! It has a rich aromatic raspberry/blackberry flavor.
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That sucks to hear that boysenberry wasn’t a great flavor. Where did you source your boysenberry plants from?
I would get Newberry but it isn’t sold anymore from what I could find online. Would you say Newberry is similar in flavor to boysenberry but better? I’m looking for that boysenberry sweet-tart flavor profile for making pies. I’m open to any ideas that could fill that niche. And was newberry very productive compared to boysenberry and marionberry?
I got my boysenberries around 20 years ago, I can’t remember that far back.
Thats too bad there is no more Newberry. I’ve not grown blackberries for awhile so am not up on whats available today. For pies the Boysen should be plenty good, berries can be underripe and still cook up well. Loganberry to me has a more interesting flavor profile but my memory is it was less productive than Boysen. Another alternative is to just mix 75% blackberries with 25% raspberries and you basically have a Boysenberry pie 
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@krismoriah might be able to sell you some Newberry. And if you give me a year or so I should also be able to get you some
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I have plenty of them available. Each crown divides and forms its own crown upon crown. So one plant will in 5 years have about 50 primocanes coming up at once.. This isnt discussed anywhere that i have read.. but it is insanely out of control once established.
They are a pruners dream to grow. The lower laterals if not managed will snake their way 20 feet in every direction.. and also create more plants if not well managed.
The end result of tedious pruning and managing is a berry that is truly dessert quality. Worth the effort? Yes.
However it is not worth the effort to grow Boysen or Logan or anything else but Siskiyou IMHO.
I grow Ponca, Caddo and have grown just about everything. The only one that i have not had fruit yet is Silvan.. which has given me trouble for 3 years straight.
Siskiyou has Marion and Boysen as parents..as well as Young and Logan and Ollalie.. so IMHO it is superior to them all while each of them are highly favored in their own rights.
Newberry parentage is extremely complex with similar parentage as Siskiyou but even delving into red raspberries and black raspberries with its grandparents.
If well managed and mulched and fertilized correctly as well as growing in at least 6B/7A or above Siskiyou and Newberry would be the only ones truly worth the effort to grow with all things considered. All others will be a disappointment when tasted side by side from a fresh eating perspective.
If processing they add a wonderful profile to jams. However i think a workhorse blackberry would be warranted as the desire to eat them fresh is high.
Columbia Star or Columbia Sunrise will fill the desire to grow Marion and be the workhorse needed… as they have parentage of Marion, Siskiyou, Boysen and various strains of New Zealand cultivars..etc etc. I think Columbia Sunrise has the most potential as it omits some of the lesser hybrids and blackberries in its genes and adds better genetics..also being one of the earliest ripening of all blackberries is a bonus for me as well.
The end result is worth the effort.. having a jam that you cannot possibly buy with flavors that you never knew that you desired.
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I’d be interested in buying 2 or 3 Newberry plants. Should I private message you about it? It seems like this would be the variety most similar to boysenberry with better yield and hardiness from what I found in my research.
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I plan on posting a thread in the next few weeks. I have to thin them anyways along with some others.
Spacing should be about 10-12 feet with these.. so plan accordingly.
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Productivity of caneberries is normally expressed as pounds or tons per acre, but that is not useful for the home gardener. Caneberry varieties’ individual traits include ripe fruit size (grams), fruiting lateral spacing, and blossoms/fruits per fruiting lateral.
Boysen is roughly twice the per berry size of Marion, but has far less blooms per fruiting lateral. But total productivity has a lot of variables like cane density and training methods. I have seen U-pick Boysens that had high cane density, the canes were bundled on the top trellis wire, not having been shortened by pruning, and the result was nearly solid fruit for 200 feet. Even so, the vertical fruit band was between waist and shoulder high, about 2 feet. So perhaps not so many tons per acre.
I am bummed because the boysenberry I bought from Ison’s is thornless and I think they are supposed to have thorns?
I wasn’t even paying attention if they were supposed to have thorns or not until I saw someone here mentioning thorns.
With my training methods, I only want the trellis to be 6 feet max but the newberry can grow 20 feet long so I wonder if it would produce less under those circumstances than boysenberries. Kris mentioned the spacing for new berry is 12 feet. Boysenberry spacing is 5 feet so I wonder if they would have a similar yield per space (lets say a 25 foot row) because even though newberry yields more per plant you could fit more boysenberry plants into the same amount of space so maybe they would equal out?
I will keep an eye out for that thread. It might be helpful to post it here as well so we don’t miss it. How much will it cost per newberry plant?
Also, do you think newberry yields more than boysenberry in the same amount of space (25 foot long row)? Since you said the spacing should be 10-12 feet for newberry and the spacing for boysenberry is usually 5 feet, you would get more fruit per plant with newberry but you could fit more boysenberry plants into the same amount of space.
The 5 foot spacing is more for waterfall (fan) training.. whereas the 10-20 foot spacing is more for the lasso(rope) method.
Since you keep discussing yield.. it is simple. The more cane length you have the more yield you have.
I would rather that others like @a_Vivaldi get these going and make available than me.
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Ok, thanks for the explanation. Will you not be offering Newberry then? I would love to be able to grow this variety as the described flavor and vigor are very appealing. I love the picture!