Growing raspberries from seeds at home

Everyone knows the sweet and delicious raspberries, and there are legends about their medicinal properties. When we think about growing raspberries, we immediately imagine a garden or any plot of land in the open air. Although, if you do not have a vegetable garden, but you wish to eat berries of your own production, then it is quite possible to grow them on your balcony from seeds or seedlings.

What conditions are needed to grow raspberries at home?

Lighting and temperature regime

In the summer season, the bush requires sufficient lighting, it also needs fresh air in abundance. Therefore, to grow a bush at home, it is well suited to an open balcony. However, if the raspberry in summer during the day gets direct hot sunlight, it is better to shade the plant. You should not overheat it, it does not like this. In the autumn, you should take the pot to the apartment and set it in a well-lit place.

Planting container and soil for the raspberry tree

For this purpose, a bucket of plastic or a container with holes that will allow excess water to flow out. The volume of the selected pot should be at least 7-8 liters.

Raspberries like soil, which contains plenty of potassium and nitrogen, so fertilization is so important. Before planting the plant in the spring season, take a seedling container and fill it with a suitable soil. For this, take garden soil, peat and sand in a 1:1:1 ratio.

Fertilization and watering

Beginning in the second year, raspberries begin to fertilize. From June to mid-July, you need to feed the plant with nitrogen-containing fertilizers, and from the second part of July to August – complex fertilizers. When fertilizing, be sure to loosen the soil.

To make your future balcony crops happy, feed the plant with organic and mineral fertilizers from the fall. You can use wood ash.

Raspberries like abundant watering, but still do not overdo it! If you over water the roots, they will sour and rot. With the onset of spring and in the summer, the raspberry bush needs a rich watering.

How to grow a bush from seeds on the balcony?

Most people think that propagating raspberries by seeds is a hassle, and there might not be a harvest. But if you prepare the seeds for planting, you’ll be able to see juicy berries on your balcony in a year.

Start with the collection of seeds, although you can simply buy them in a specialized store. You should take those of the seeds that are on fully ripe berries. Unripe fruits are not suitable for this. If the berries are overripe, it is even better for collecting seeds.

Squeeze the harvested raspberries through gauze to let the juice run off. Smear what’s left over on a piece of paper or cloth flap and dry it. A ventilated room without direct sunlight is a good place to dry the seeds. Do not over dry the seeds; they must retain a percentage of moisture!

The dried seeds should be sown in sandy peat soil. It is better to darken the pot, water the soil abundantly so that it is moderately moist. Young plants from seeds sprout reluctantly, they germinate unevenly. Some shoots form in the spring, while others will take a couple of years to emerge. When a few leaves have sprouted, prick the plant (transfer it to a larger container). However, if the thickets are sparse, you can do without this procedure. For spring sowing you should keep the seeds in a wet bag, which should be kept in the fridge at 0 to +5g.

If you want to sow the seeds on the balcony in autumn, advance them into the soil by 1-2 centimeters, covering them with sand and humus.

Pruning the plant

This procedure is important for the plant. Fruiting shoots in the spring period are usually shortened by about 20 centimeters. From the 2nd year onwards, the shoots should be pruned annually. When winter is over, the shoot should be trimmed to around 10 centimetres at its base, leaving the strongest bud.

Plants grown from seed as well as those sprouted from seedlings begin to bear fruit in the second year of life.

From seedling to first harvest

Growing raspberries at home can turn into a real hobby for you. To make this process for you into a fun action, you need to adhere to certain rules, then the plant on the balcony will not differ at all from its relatives from the garden:

1. Prepare the appropriate soil and a suitable pot, which will ensure good drainage of excess liquid.
2. The seedlings should be soaked in room temperature water for several hours.
3. Place the rhizome of the seedling in the dug hole and cover it with the fertilized soil. In doing so, do everything as carefully as possible, so as not to damage the root system of the young plant. Instead of fertilizer, wood ash will work well. Tamp down the soil.
4. Well water the planted bushes, the moisture should remain on the surface.
5. Those buds that will appear, it is necessary to remove for the formation of the plant a strong wood. On each bush leave 3-5 strong shoots, get rid of the rest.
6. During the summer, protect the plants on the balcony from direct sunlight, so as not to overheat. Water and nourish raspberries.
7. In autumn, reduce watering and stop nitrogen fertilisation. You need to prepare it for winter.
8. At the first frosts, insulate the root system, as it is most sensitive to cold. But the shoots themselves need a cold regime below +5 for the formation of buds. To do this, you need to keep them in the cold for 800-900 hours.For cooling, you can use a refrigerator.
9. After the cooling period has passed, the plant is placed in a room with a temperature regime of +10 to +18. Weak shoots should be trimmed, leaving 3-5 of the strongest ones. Watering and feeding with nitrogen fertilizers is done.
10. The first young shoots should be removed, on the second wave leave a few shoots, the others are got rid of.

Remontant raspberry and its varieties

The harvest of an ordinary raspberry is formed within two years, but today the breeders have developed a more convenient technology, allowing to grow berries in one year. Remontant raspberry varieties bear fruit on annual shoots in August-September. In general, remontant is the ability of the plant to produce fruit continuously. But remontant raspberry bears fruit both on annual shoots and on biennial stems. But usually two harvests in one season do not work, because this greatly weakens the bush.

Therefore, most often the remontant varieties bear fruit on annual shoots in late summer or early spring. In June, the shoots themselves appear, in July – fruit twigs and flowers, in August – beautiful berries.

Abroad, specialists have created a variety of remontant varieties, but the requirements of these plants do not meet the climate of the average strip of our country. Therefore, for domestic gardeners, these types of raspberries are not suitable, because the fruits ripen only 20-30% before the first cold weather.

There are many different varieties that are perfectly acclimated to our weather conditions and give excellent results. This is the merit of domestic scientists-breeders.

If you want a harvest right on your balcony, take these remontant raspberry varieties.

They all differ in the size of the berries and their color, shape, and shade of flavor. There are fruits of orange and golden color. Choose at your discretion.

Varieties of remontant raspberries:

• apricot;
• August miracle;
• Indian summer-2;
• Bryanskoe divo;
• brilliants;
• heracle;
• eurasia;
• Evening dawn;
• golden domes;
• reliable;
• ruby necklace;
• orange miracle.

To grow delicious and useful berries on your balcony, you will need the information described above, and a desire. Do not be lazy and take care of your raspberry bushes, then you will be pleasantly rewarded in the form of beautiful fruits!