not yet, it was only an inch tall when I received it from Burpee in February
is it supposed to taste as good as Columbia Star?
Do you mean they are hard to break off or are these supposed to pop off the “cone” like raspberries? Or are they super soft and can crumble when picked? I just added a beautiful Newberry from @krismoriah this spring so I’m curious how the picking will compare to Tayberries which get very soft when fully ripe.
I’ll also be curious about the growth of Newberry compared to other trailing types. I’m hoping for a bit thicker, beefier canes, but really have no idea.I think my Tayberries succumbed to the same borer issues that @TNHunter had with his logans, which I think has to do with the super long, thin canes. They died back almost to the crown which surprised me when they should be hardier than our 5 degrees or so we saw this winter. I noticed that tip rooted canes where actually still alive several feet back from where they rooted which didn’t make sense since that should be the tender end of the cane and then I started finding borers in the canes when I was cutting them out.
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Unstoppable once they get going. A nightmare of canes. My only advice on year 3 is to be diligent in pruning out pcanes early or you will never figure out whats what.
Probably my most aggressive plant… and a true chore to maintain.
Tough as nails… drought loving. (last years drought didnt phase it).
I did however lose about half of my canes to this past winter vortex… and all canes of Loganberry, Siskiyou and Kotata etc…so it is indeed the most cold hardy if anyone is keeping record. Only wyeberry is in the same ballpark of cold hardiness here… i will get fruit from both but only about 3ft out of 12 foot or so survived the cold.
edit: one crown out of 10 of my newberry that i have trellised is setting flower on the wire…so one of out 10 had the least winter damage… no science behind it that i can see…
As far as fruiting goes… i didnt have any issue picking. I usually look at the calyx unless im used to the dull sheen on a certain cultivar.
Tayberry is a dessert only berry for me. Unless i pick to flash freeze or am making jam soon… they are different. Too soft really but a nice handful is welcome during a walkabout.
Borers are eventually going to get me i think… they live in the nearby trees that surround me… so i dont think once they get going that you will ever be free of them… more likely than not they will get worse. I think most folks with nice trees and forest nearby with borers will agree…they seem to get worse with time.
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Columbia Star has more soluble solids and less acidity than Columbia Giant. Very slightly less soluble solids and slightly more acidic than Hall’s Beauty. I have all three plants right now but I’m planning to keep Hall’s Beauty because it’s sweet and flowers nice.
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Exactly what I’m looking for. I don’t tend to them, so they have to fight for their lives here.
What do Tayberries taste like?
Taste is different for everybody, but everyone in our family agreed that Tayberries did not taste as good as the raspberries that I was growing nor as good as the invasive Himalayan blackberries that are free for the picking all over the Pacific Northwest. They’re not bad, just not good enough; I got rid of them after a couple of years.
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I developed quite a dislike for tayberries. They are unconfortably thorny, but more important to me, these fruits don‘t pick very well since they don‘t know what to do with their receptacle.
Blackberries detach when ripe, raspberries slide off it, but these do neither. On top of that they are somewhat soft when fully ripe, so it‘s hard to not damage them when you pick them.
The taste is ok, like a soft blackberry with a slight perfume aroma, but nothing to rave about either.
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I tried growing them in the Subtropics and to be concise, they were crap.
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When you harvest Tayberry, you do not pull on the berry. You rock/hinge the berry to get it off. You must be tasting a different Tayberry than I have eaten, because there is precisely 0% blackberry flavor in Tayberry.
I also tried Silvanberry but it was as bad as Tayberry. Very sour, flavourless fruit and nasty spines.
Your loss…its one of the best hybrids.
One of the most prolific fruiting, sweetest and earliest ripening blackberry hybrids.
'‘Silvan’ has gained favor among con
sumers and processors because of its excel
lent flavor, which, when fully ripe, is sweeter
and less acid than ‘Boysen’, ‘Marion’
July there is May(ish) here.
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I have a question to you hybrid connaisseurs. Are Logan and boysen berries descendants of trailing blackberries rubus ursinus and thus less frost hardy than upright blackberries with rubus allegheniensis in them? I have good success with upright and semi-upright blackberries but for my boysens I don‘t really know how to trellis them because either I trellis them and they die over winter or at least take heavy damage, or I leave them on the ground where they overwinter fine, but fall victim of the lawn mower…
I’m in zone 7 and experience some die back with our boysenberries laid against the ground in the winter. It’s seems to be rather random which canes suffer partial die back and which don’t.
maybe try covering them with at least a tarp. it will trap ground heat. i use heavy fleece i got from a discount store. it doesnt rot but it also breathes some. with some snow on top is a perfect protector for them.
I was growing Silvanberry and Tayberry in the Subtropics. Rubus is well know to perform very differently in different climates. Both Tayberry and Silvanberry were bred in cold climates and are sweeter there, in the Subtropics they do not sweeten up, neither does Marionberry, which was also too sour to eat and lacked any raspberry flavour, although it had a good Blackberry flavour.
That is why I am breeding Blackberry,Raspberry and hybrids that do better in the Subtropics.
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Interesting… as lots of folks are posting harvests now from Florida that are way ahead of me in fruiting.
I read alot of posts on the FB/Reddit and other venues that people grow things… the factor that seems most prevalent of ‘how do i get this sweeter’ ‘why is this or that not sweet’ seems to be water to me…
Some of the best Boysen and Loganberries and other hybrids are grown in arid California.
Anyways i think there is a correlation between sweetness (brix) and flavor and water.
Fruitnut is able to restrict in his greenhouses and get brix up much more than some folks that are avid waterers or irrigators…but that is just my theory and YMMV.
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I’ve noticed the more acidic my potting soil is, the tastier my berries.
I had Anne in more alkaline the other years and they tasted awful. I’m assuming same with Joan j too. Last year, i finally had anne in acidic mix and the fruits were amazing. Same with fall gold.
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Do you think a mix thats mostly peat moss is too acidic? I think I measured my mix to be around 4.5 and I was planning on adding some potash to raise it
You might do better just to mix it with some compost or regular potting soil. That should raise it up a little bit while providing nutrients as well. At what ratio? I have no clue…
I mix my acid mix with compost or another bagged potting mix for random things that i know likes a little bit of acid on their feetsies. Like, azaleas and such… also do this when I’m low on potting soil too
Western Oregon is a prime area for commercial caneberry crops and research.
The climate there is wet until fruit formation and ripening in June and July, when the weather turns warm/hot and dry.
But there is a region in far north Washington state, west of the mountains, that is well-known for red raspberries. I would think they are wetter and cooler in all months, compared to the Oregon area.
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