Author Topic: Best cheap place to buy a blackberry and raspberry bush  (Read 1319 times)

Gin1984

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Best cheap place to buy a blackberry and raspberry bush
« on: April 10, 2022, 10:57:17 AM »
I wanted to plant each of these but looking for the best place to buy.  Home depot has them for $15-20/each, anyone know of any sales or sites with better deals?

maizefolk

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Re: Best cheap place to buy a blackberry and raspberry bush
« Reply #1 on: April 10, 2022, 11:08:30 AM »
Be careful with on-sale raspberry bushes. A couple of times I've seen these at home garden centers with what what look like clear signs of raspberry leaf curl virus.

Gin1984

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Re: Best cheap place to buy a blackberry and raspberry bush
« Reply #2 on: April 10, 2022, 12:37:18 PM »
Thanks!

Dreamer40

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Re: Best cheap place to buy a blackberry and raspberry bush
« Reply #3 on: April 10, 2022, 12:42:41 PM »
This is the season to find local plant sales. Libraries, community centers, schools, etc have annual plant sales in April and May. Otherwise, I would buy from a local reputable nursery. You might spend a few more dollars than Home Depot, but you can get something better suited for your particular needs and planting site that will give you better fruit in the longterm.

Fishindude

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Re: Best cheap place to buy a blackberry and raspberry bush
« Reply #4 on: April 10, 2022, 01:47:21 PM »
If they grow wild in your area, just move a few plants to where you want them.
They're abundant in the wild around here.   Walk out the back door and start picking.

 

uniwelder

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Re: Best cheap place to buy a blackberry and raspberry bush
« Reply #5 on: April 10, 2022, 02:47:57 PM »
If they grow wild in your area, just move a few plants to where you want them.
They're abundant in the wild around here.   Walk out the back door and start picking.

+1 Agreed. We’ve had wild volunteers grow up along the fence around our property and cared for them.

If there aren’t any growing wild, ask on a ‘buy nothing’ group to dig up shoots from a neighbor.

seattlecyclone

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Re: Best cheap place to buy a blackberry and raspberry bush
« Reply #6 on: April 10, 2022, 04:36:55 PM »
If they grow wild in your area, just move a few plants to where you want them.
They're abundant in the wild around here.   Walk out the back door and start picking.

+1 Agreed. We’ve had wild volunteers grow up along the fence around our property and cared for them.

If there aren’t any growing wild, ask on a ‘buy nothing’ group to dig up shoots from a neighbor.

This is the way. Someone in my neighborhood Buy Nothing group was clearing out a raspberry patch last year. Several of us took a few plants home. Mine seem to be establishing themselves nicely.

nereo

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Re: Best cheap place to buy a blackberry and raspberry bush
« Reply #7 on: April 10, 2022, 05:52:48 PM »
If they grow wild in your area, just move a few plants to where you want them.
They're abundant in the wild around here.   Walk out the back door and start picking.

+1 Agreed. We’ve had wild volunteers grow up along the fence around our property and cared for them.

If there aren’t any growing wild, ask on a ‘buy nothing’ group to dig up shoots from a neighbor.

This is the way. Someone in my neighborhood Buy Nothing group was clearing out a raspberry patch last year. Several of us took a few plants home. Mine seem to be establishing themselves nicely.
+3.  Once established they take over quickly, because they are vines that thrive in disturbed habitat (like gardens or the sides of roads).  I’ve often wondered who would actually buy them, as I always seem to know several people who are trying to thin out the ones on their property on any given year.

RetiredAt63

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Re: Best cheap place to buy a blackberry and raspberry bush
« Reply #8 on: April 10, 2022, 07:28:27 PM »
Also, garden clubs often have spring sales as fund raisers. 

calimom

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Re: Best cheap place to buy a blackberry and raspberry bush
« Reply #9 on: April 10, 2022, 09:21:18 PM »
Last year I scored some free blueberry bushes from a farm that was converting to grapevines. I'm babying them along and hoping for a crop! Blackberries grow wild where I live, and are sometimes a pest. Not aware of anyone planting them. This is all geographically dependent, I know.

uniwelder

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Re: Best cheap place to buy a blackberry and raspberry bush
« Reply #10 on: April 11, 2022, 06:39:05 AM »
If they grow wild in your area, just move a few plants to where you want them.
They're abundant in the wild around here.   Walk out the back door and start picking.

+1 Agreed. We’ve had wild volunteers grow up along the fence around our property and cared for them.

If there aren’t any growing wild, ask on a ‘buy nothing’ group to dig up shoots from a neighbor.

I just wanted to throw this in before someone else blames me for giving bad info----

Wild blackberry and raspberry varieties aren't going to give the same kind of fruit as a cultivated one.  Certainly they will be free, but fruit might be half the size, greater percentage of seeds, not fruit for as long, etc.  Hopefully you can dig up a neighbor's that they like.

maizefolk

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Re: Best cheap place to buy a blackberry and raspberry bush
« Reply #11 on: April 11, 2022, 07:09:35 AM »
Uniwelders point is a good one but I still feel compelled to add my N=1 anecdote: I don’t know about blackberries but the black raspberries (Rubus occidentalis) that grew wild in my part of the world as a child were hardier, tastier, and more productive than any of the various domesticated raspberries my parents tried to establish in our yard. But we didn’t live in a place where raspberries were grown commercially so it may just have been that none of the varieties my folks could order were well adapted to our climate.

YttriumNitrate

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Re: Best cheap place to buy a blackberry and raspberry bush
« Reply #12 on: April 11, 2022, 07:57:14 AM »
I've had good success ordering bare root plants from Double A Vineyards.* However, it is way too late to be putting in an order for spring planting (Oct-Dec is better) so most of the good places will be just about sold out of everything.

https://doubleavineyards.com/blackberry-plants-for-sale
https://doubleavineyards.com/raspberry-plants-for-sale

**The climate around Buffalo, NY is similar to where I am, so just about everything they sell should work where I am. If you are in a vastly different location, it's better to find a supplier more closely aligned with your location.
« Last Edit: April 11, 2022, 07:59:51 AM by YttriumNitrate »

Cranky

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Re: Best cheap place to buy a blackberry and raspberry bush
« Reply #13 on: April 11, 2022, 08:12:10 AM »
I’m putting in new raspberry beds and I ordered them from Jung’s, which is local to me but they ship nationwide. I wanted specific varieties.

kite

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Re: Best cheap place to buy a blackberry and raspberry bush
« Reply #14 on: April 11, 2022, 08:13:58 AM »
$15-$20 each seems high.  A lot depends on the health & maturity of the plant you are buying.
My local Lidl has them 3/$15 today.  I doubt I'd have any recourse if the Lidl plants turned out to be fruitless, but Home Depot likely provides some kind of guarantee.

Our raspberries came from friends who were putting on an addition to their parent's farmhouse. That effort required clearing and moving the raspberry patch.  We started with 6 freebies.....  And we've fed a lot of birds over the past 30 years. 
Berries + birds -> berry colored birdshit = disaster for freshly washed laundry drying in the sun. 

As ours are "everbearing" this was a twice yearly problem.  But once we found the solution (lace curtains) we've had a delicious handfull of berries every now and then.  Same lace-curtain trick works for the blueberries, though not for strawberries, as squirrels are relentless. 



 

bigdoug03

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Re: Best cheap place to buy a blackberry and raspberry bush
« Reply #15 on: April 14, 2022, 12:02:48 PM »
indianaberry.com is about the cheapest online, and they send some pretty good plants. They will be smaller than what you see at the home stores, but smaller plants transplant better and brambles grow like literal weeds. I order most of my fruit bushes from there.

FrugalShrew

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Re: Best cheap place to buy a blackberry and raspberry bush
« Reply #16 on: April 14, 2022, 12:11:26 PM »
I got some beautiful raspberry bushes on craigslist once--it's worth checking!

Cranky

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Re: Best cheap place to buy a blackberry and raspberry bush
« Reply #17 on: April 14, 2022, 12:34:03 PM »
Aldi has berry bushes on sale this week.