Today, I boxed in my Black rapsberries with below ground retaining boards so they cant escape into my neighbours place
This reminds me of my experience watching the competition between my neighbor's blackberries and raspberries
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I had grown raspberries and knew that they do just fine here. Blackberries were an interest because I like them, lived with them elsewhere, but knew that they struggle here. And, these were very nice blackberries and if they sprawled just a bit, I could reach the ripe fruit while standing at the edge of my garden
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I could reach and appreciate the raspberries, too. That reach became easier and easier as the robust blackberry vines pushed out their smaller, red cousins.
And, push they did! After about 10 years of growing in the same row, the blackberries had entirely displayed the raspberry vines. Meanwhile, those plant rhizomes had travelled about 6' to where I set up a trellis for them
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It was not all going great guns for the blackberries, however. The problem for that species is partly that our winters are often too cold. By the time the raspberries were flourishing in the corner of my garden, the original location of the blackberries was entirely populated by DEAD plants. There were only a few left where the raspberries had once grown!
Had the blackberries learned humility? No. When I left that garden after my 20 year stay, I had been physically pushing back at the tiny, nearly inconsequential remnant of the blackberries. I even removed some rhizomes so they wouldn't complete the migration from one garden to the other, however feeble that may have been.
Steve
