Blackberries, Raspberries and Hybrids

FYI Womack Nursery is open for business again now that it’s November, you can buy Brison, Womack, and Rosborough from there and be sure they’re all healthy and true to name

2 Likes

Womack is the least desirable to me… they dont sell Brazos…which isnt worth fooling with IMHO.

Im done with them…and moving onward to others that interest me.

Im still holding my ground that Ebony King is my favorite of the lesser known thorned varieties. In my location its been getting worse with the cane borers… most of my trailing ones get hit hard.
Ebony King and Illini seem to be my winners for having thick, thorny undesirable canes to them. Both fruit fairly early and have less issues with SWD as well.

If you have no issues with cane borers or SWD then the TAMU releases will at least test your gloves. They are the only ones that challenge my welding gloves having needle like thorns that are a total PITA.

1 Like

Are you finding out that these guys are finally starting to wear out? :wink:

3 Likes

Nope.

A few of them have these hypodermic needle like thorns and somehow some way a one in a million one will hit just right and i will get a sliver. Or maybe somewhere in the glove there is an achilles thats possible too.

These are just A6 which is probably good enough… but i wouldnt mind trying these A9 Predator gloves.

2 Likes

weird, to me I don’t find them any worse than Kiowa and Lawton in regards to thorn sharpness

As for “hypodermic needles” , for me that crown goes to Marionberry and Obsidian. I can’t touch Marion at all without it leaving some little needles in my fingers, and Obsidian seriously looks like needles

2 Likes


On the topic of thorns, I’ve had one of these go through my foot while I was pregnant :melting_face: the woes of citrus but at least they mostly disappear with age.

I refuse to grow anything bramble or cane thorny like that unless i was unaware like i was with my niwot…

I think these canes have the worst hypodermic needles I’ve found past flue shots.



Yes, my hands did pay the price for those photos, regardless of how lightly I held it.

5 Likes

Ever thought about taking a knife or something and just scraping them off? :sweat_smile:

I doubt yours are mature with canes the size of golf club handles… they get much thornier as they mature.

The most evil thorns i have are Illini. Those canes are the size of baseball bat handles and have long sharp thorns.

The most insane thorns are on Kotata…even its thorns have thorns it seems.

I found a mutation of some sort that was growing in a boggy area… i should have fruit of it next spring. It has thorns like a bird of prey talons…they hook instead of prick.

3 Likes

It’s a chinois strainer. I grew up with one my mother and grandmother used. It predates the Foley mill, etc. I still use the pestle from this strainer for my rolling pin.

1 Like

Not sure we have discussed it before… but this past weekend I did some division on raspberry plants that some folks took me up on offer of some plants that i have.

I see folks asking when to take cuttings of raspberry plants, or trying to tip layer them… even putting root balls on them. You dont have to do that.

This works after year 2 once you have a fully formed crown and primocanes have fruited or the floricanes are hardened off going into dormancy.

Cut all canes to a handle… about a foot high.

Remove Clump (having about 4-6 or more handles.

Soak and clean that clump in water then you can remove each individual cane (most of the time). Each one of those canes should have their own set of roots and a tiny primocane at the base of the cane into the crown.

Yes you will lose a season on floricanes by doing this… but if you want 4/5/6 new plants… this is very efficient at having new plants.

Sure you can take root cuttings… but that takes 1 extra year.

This is how nurseries do it that sell bare root handles.

You can also do it with alot of trailing blackberries… if you notice your clump has like 30 primocanes coming up out of it…thats why… there are like 5 individual plants in there all sending up Pcanes.

Pretty handy for propagating… if you want to grow more of something or give some to friends or family etc.

11 Likes

Thorns, even the huge nasty ones on some of the citrumelos and honey locust I have and the insane coverage and sharpness on stuff like Kiowa, I can handle. Glochids? I draw the line at glochids.

2 Likes

You don’t like the invisible force sting that they leave behind unless you shine a light on it to see? :rofl:

1 Like

Truly horrific. I messed with a blind prickly pear pad once…you learn your lesson

1 Like

I found out the hard way too lol

1 Like

Yes. A thorn of horrors. I used to harvest the fruit to make jelly, very good, but at what cost… The first time I did it was just by grabbing the prickly pears off the plant with my bare hands, won’t do that again. Always blowtorch.

3 Likes

Time to move my Clark’s Healthberry plants to a permanent location, as much as they want to stay put:) they fruited on the wood you left clark! Thanks!


4 Likes

that thing looks like a monster, like a cross between kiowa and lawton or something :smiley:

how do the berries taste? have any pics of them? does it spread underground?

3 Likes

They are legendary for their suckering

1 Like