Rubus fruticosus 

'Blackberry/Bramble'

[Ex. Co. Durham, England]

Rosaceae: scrambling shrub to 3m, arching stems are armed with variably shaped prickles and root when they touch the ground. Found in hedgerows and scrub. The flowers can be white or pink and appear from May-August. The fruit are the familiar blackberries. Widespread and common.

USES:

The fruit can be used raw or cooked, and it is possible to obtain these ripe fruits from late July to November. The fruit is also made into syrups, jams and other preserves, some people find that if they eat the fruit before it is very ripe and quite soft then it can give them stomach upsets. Root can be cooked, but the root should be neither to young nor too old and requires a lot of boiling. A tea is made from the dried leaves, the young leaves are said to be the best to use. The leaves are often used in herbal tea blends.

The root-bark and the leaves are strongly astringent, depurative, diuretic, tonic and vulnerary, they make an excellent remedy for dysentery, diarrhoea, haemorrhoids, cystitis etc., and the root is the more astringent. Externally, they are used as a gargle to treat sore throats, mouth ulcers and gum inflammations. A decoction of the leaves is useful as a gargle in treating thrush and also makes a good general mouthwash.

GROWING INFORMATION:

Blackberry seeds have a deep dormancy within them, this requires a degree of patience to overcome and it is usually quite easy to get high levels of germination if the correct procedures are followed.

First prepare a free draining substrate into which the seeds are to be mixed, this can be a 50/50 mixture of compost and sharp sand, or perlite, vermiculite. The chosen substrate needs to be moist (but not wet), if you can squeeze water out of it with your hand it is too wet and your seeds may drown and die. Mix the seeds into the substrate, making sure that there is enough volume of material to keep the seeds separated. Place the seed mixture into a clear plastic bag (freezer bags, especially zip-lock bags are very useful for this -provided a little gap is left in the seal for air exchange) If it is not a zip-lock type bag it needs to be loosely tied. Then write the date on the bag so that you know when the pre-treatment was started.

The seeds first require a period of warm pre-treatment and need to be kept in temperatures of 20°C for a period of 10 weeks. During this time make sure that the pre-treatment medium does not dry out at any stage or it will be ineffective!

Next the seeds require a cold period to break the final part of the dormancy, this is easily achieved by placing the bag in the fridge at 4°C for at least 12 weeks. It is quite possible for the seeds to germinate in the bag at these temperatures when they are ready to do so, if they do, just remove them from the bag and carefully plant them up. When the period of pre-treatment has finished the seed should be ready to be planted. Small quantities can be sown in pots or seed trays filled with a good quality compost and cover them with a thin layer of compost no more than 1cm deep. For larger quantities it is easiest to sow the seeds in a well prepared seedbed outdoors once the warm and cold pre-treatments have finished and wait for the seedlings to appear.

It has also been found that fluctuating pre-treatment temperatures can give the best germination results and I have myself had excellent results by keeping the mixed seeds in a cold shed through the winter for the cold stage of their pre-treatment and allowing the temperature to fluctuate naturally. Ungerminated seeds can have the whole warm and cold process repeated again to enable more seeds to germinate. Fresh seedlings can keep germinating for up to 5 years after the original sowing date.

Do not expose newly sown seeds to high temperatures (above 25°C). Keep the seedlings well-watered and weed free. Growth in the first year is usually between 20-40cm depending on the time of germination and cultural techniques and developing seedlings are usually trouble free. Growth from the second year onwards will be much stronger -possibly several meters in length. Cut back excessive growth to make replanting easier and to make plant establishment quicker. Allow them to grow for 2 years before planting them in a permanent position.

Easily grown in a moisture retentive but well-drained loamy soil of at least moderate quality.

HARVESTED: 2019

 

APPROX. 100+ SEEDS