I am interested in getting an every bearing raspberry variety called “Vintage red”, I have been googling for it but found limited information from someone who already plant them, most info I can gather are from nursery websites.
I am in Japan and we have limited choices here, I am currently growing Indian Summer. Other choices to get would be Heritage, Nantahala, Autumn Bliss, and maybe Caroline.
Crop size is a important because I have limited space.
I hope some here can share some advice.
Thanks!
I only have Caroline of those four, it’s in its third year and has quite a few canes. But, it’s the only red everbearer I have. It’s not nearly as prolific as my gold everbearers (Fall Gold, Anne).
thank you fir the replies. caroline sounds good, but the only way i can get Caroline is through online auction from someone who claimed he imported it. there is no nursery selling it here, so im a bit concern about its authenticity, the vintage however is sold by a reputable nursery. so i am hoping to hear of first hand experience.
I don’t know about the variety “vintage red” but an old red variety that has been grown here for a very long time and excelled in heat cold and drought is “heritage” it is probably my best producer and easiest to care for. You can make it primo or floricane by choice i mow each patch every other year to keep them new yet still get more berries. Only negative is she has real spines but she is worth it i think. I hear good things about autumn bliss also but have not grown it.
autumn bliss is a early and heavy producer. heritage has good berries but ripens too late here and you lose some of the crop. polka and joan j are heavy producers and joan j is thornless.
I’m also a very big fan of joan J very delicious berries, very good production and handles drought and cold pretty good so far. I assume heritage would put on a early crop for you if you left it up she does real good for me on freeze damage and i feel you get a much safer snow coating. I mowed joan j down to encourage more shoots last year.
i had them for 4 yrs. and removed because of above mentioned issues. horntail wasp caused a lot of cane damage as well. only half the crop would ripen before the frost killed them here. berries were very good though.
have you considered buying seeds of cultivars you want and get them that way? seed isn’t regulated like plants and cuttings. it might take awhile before you get berries but once you have them, then you will always have some shoots to add to your berry patch. ebay sells all kinds for cheap.
The temperature is mild here, the coldest is about three degrees above freezing. thanks for pointing out that heritage is a late producer.
About Joan J, there is a cultivar here called Joan Square and it is also thornless, I can get them as well, but not sure if it is related to Joan J. I will search about it.
I picked this variety with glee at 5 but have become more of a sissy as i have gotten older it seems! Good luck i’m sure you will be happy with whatever you get! Also the idea of seeds are great because those may adapt to your area and you can definitely get lucky and get excellent tasting varieties with bramble seedlings
Thank you. I checked the seeds but maybe they are difficult to Import here to Japan.
Joan Squire which is Joan J parent, sounds tempting mainly because it is thornless but it is quite expensive here (about 70USD for one plant), Vintage red is about half of that price, heritage is even cheaper (just because it is an older variety I think).
It gets very hot and humid here in summer, I think I will wait and see how the Indian Summer do first, then decide if I should get more raspberries.