Cane fruit quality as plants mature

General Fruit Growing
#1

Is improved fruit quality an established phenomenon with cane fruits? For grapes, people often rave about flavor from older vines and it seems like most young fruit trees produce better fruit as the tree matures.

I had always assumed berry quality would not tend to get better much with plant age, since individual crowns are often so short lived. But over the last 4 years I have noticed (or imagined?) improved flavor in a few blackberry varieties. So far, these have all been semi-upright ones with fewer suckers and a consistent main crown. The reason I’m asking is because I’m tryin to decide how many years I should give some of the U of Ark varieties to achieve full tastiness.

Do cane fruits improve with plant maturity?
  • YES
  • NO

0 voters

#2

Your mention of the short-lived nature of the fruiting canes is a good one.

I think growing conditions and pests or diseases that vary from year to year have more effect on caneberry flavor. If any one variety of your caneberry plants has achieved expected growth vigor and fruit size, that is all you can expect for flavor, regardless of the planting site age in years.