A friend let me dig out some small thornless blackberries yesterday. I didn’t quite get all the roots pulled up in tact on the larger ones. They were placed in the ground with some manure compost within the hour right before a huge rain system came through last night (central Kentucky). Unfortunately didn’t have time to mulch before that rain but plan to tomorrow. I discovered today that many of the leaves were completely soaked in mud. I brushed them off as best as possible but ultimately pruned them because they seemed too worse for wear. I had already pruned the top growth. Wondering if there’s any hope for these lil guys over time… thoughts? We’re supposed to have some bright sunny days ahead.
by sunkissedzebra
2 Comments
Blackberries are pretty darn hardy, don’t do any more pruning, get some mulch or some more organics on top of the soil. Hopefully they will bounce back.
Something seems odd with your soil for some reason. Was this an old road or pathway?
Blackberries are particularly hardy.
My opinion is if you did get root mass then I would leave them be (not even prune them)
Distressed plants know what they can and can’t support and will allow the parts it cant to die, and while it’s easier to remove excess foliage to assist in that process it is far easier to just let the plant do its thing.
This is obviously a much different situation when you are working with bare root store purchases or in the wild cutting propagation.
My experience is whenever you can get root mass in a transplant of blackberry or raspberry you will have almost 100% success rate.
Just be patient and let the canes do their own thing.
If your really worried I would recommend giving them full shade for a week or two while they acclimate. This is to prevent the sun from excess burning of weakened/droopy leaves due to shock.