Favorite berries for zone 6a?

I'm working on adding some fruit to my urban homestead.  We want our "yard" to be full of food.  So we are trying out some fruit tree guilds and other intensive intercropping strategies.

So far I have an established italian plum tree, a very sad blackberry bush that may not be coming back, 2 raspberry bushes, a baby fig tree and a red currant bush.

I'd like to bring in mulberries, gooseberries and blueberries.

Do you have a favorite berry bush that works in zome 6a?  

Goumi berries

Maarten

Hey,
I live in zone 6 probably a little closer to zone 6b but the same plant i list should work fine for you too.
We grow mostly the varietys of blueberries that you find in local stores lile blue ray, blue crop etc. They do well as long as the ground is prepared right. Also pink lemonade blue berries seem to do well and have a little bit different flavor.
I would say brambles do very well in this zone. So don't be put of by a sad one. We have thornless blackberry, black raspberry, purple raspberry, red raspberry and others. All are very good and grow well.
Figs tend to die back to the ground with hard freezes but usually produce a decent crop despite that. I'm planning on putting in a lot more. Brown turkey and chicago hardy are the two i have right now.
Persimmon trees, at least american persimmons do well also.
We are trying a lot more kinds of edible perennials but nothing is big enough to evaluate yet.
I reccomend experimenting, if it doesnt work out, try something else. Hope that helps!

I’m in 6B. I planted about a dozen blueberry bushes last year. Waiting to see what survived.

I planted according to the shipper’s instructions. Not that it will matter if they don’t live as they were bought through eBay.

But I figured it wouldn’t hurt.

I got a variety, Jersey, Bluecrop, & Bluray 🤞

I have 10 types of berries that I'm growing on my Zone 6b urban homestead.  Here are my experiences:
 

Aronia (chokeberry, McKenzie & Nero)- 7yrs- semi-shaded- minimal production

Elderberry (Nova & York)- 7yrs- semi-shaded- Fairly productive. Would be significantly more productive with more light and water than my current setup.

Mulberry tree (generic black-berried)- ~30yrs- very productive

Blackberry (Prime-Ark Freedom & Traveler)- 7yrs- Semi-productive- My favorite berry, but I've had to provide significant support and replace a couple of plants.

Raspberry (Jaclyn Primocane)- 7yrs- Very well adapted, tends to spread.  Minimal support needed.

Goji (Big & Sweet Lifeberry)- 7yrs- very productive and well adapted, tends to spread, a little harder to harvest

Goumi (Red Gem & Sweet Scarlet)- 7yrs- Very productive, nitrogen-fixer, doesn't spread, large thorns, tastes like sour cherry.  Would make an excellent border plant.

Kiwi (Hardy Issai)- 6yrs- Has never produced.  Puts out leaves early and then is knocked back by late freezes.

Magnolia Vine (Schisandra; Eastern Prince)- 2yrs- Tough plant, still growing in.  Hasn't produced yet.

Grape (Mars)- 6yrs- Supposedly resistant to disease, but has had continuous problems (disease & insects).  Pulling it out this year.

Hey 6a/6b here!
My grandfather grew black raspberries like they were competing for Olympic fame in this area. Primary 34" tall, then cut it off. Grow between 2 t- shaped posts (not to be confused with T-posts) that have a 3-4' top bar span and 3-4 wires running horizontally between the t-posts at either end of the row. Lay the secondary branches over the wires, so they don't root and become a thorny mass. Cut them to 2 ft. long at the end of the season and get ready for new growth next Spring.

I grow Chicago Hardy fig, which I found out are water hogs with shallow fragile roots that really love fertilizer. It will be 3 years old, and is a consistent producer. I have a second baby fig. We'll see if it makes a showing this year.

I grow pixwell gooseberry if I can save it from the birds. It seems happy next to the fig.

I have had poor success with thornless triple crown blackberries. Gonna try again this year.

My question is, can I use store blueberries to grow from? I thought I'd try it this year.
Please advise.
Thanks,

Oh the irony.
My name is Amy Berry (really)

Great thread!
For me :
Grapes- been around for years, all production destroyed by disease, back rot
Rasberries-any years, amazing production, eager reproduction,an entire front yard of plants from single start.
Blackberries- many years,amazing production, easy to propagate, can't compete with grape vines.
Hardy Kiwi- more than 5 years no production.
Moved it once, has grown better since then,still no berries.
Blackcap Raspberries- one year, amazing production, super tasty, lots of thorns,really aggressive, spread out of it's container over winter!
(I moved them to my second yard, to save my family!)
Elderberry-first year, just a twig
Honeyberries-first year,two little twigs
Paw paw-first year, just a twig.
Blueberries-many years, meh production, grown in barrels of peat, fertilized with urine and citrus.
Mulberry: self sown wild trees have produced, purchased tree never has.
Plenty of production, harvest is too fiddly.
I'm trying to propagate them, for the wood and leaves.
Hardy Fig-first year,overwintering indoors, might be dead.

My conclusion: cane fruits are the bomb diggity in my zone 6.
No work needed beyond trellising, and even.that is for my convenience.
They will benefit from irrigation during dry spells, but they can get by fine without it.
Easily propagated.
I will be getting more of them.

Thank you all so much.  The quick list breakdowns have been extremely helpful.  

The fig that I have is also a chicago hardy, and it's brand new, so I am glad to know about its' roots and temperment.

I'm all for experimenting.  I think that I will bring in half a dozen more brambles, half a dozen blueberries, a handful of mulberries, and probably a handful of raspberry bushes as well.  If I can find gooseberries, I'll bring those in as well.  The stores in my area have started carrying them, which surprises me, but they are tasty, so maybe i should be more surprised that it has taken this long.  

I always forget about goji berries...I've heard they are surprisingly easy to grow.  

Goumi - now that is one i've never heard of.  I'm going to do a little research, but who knows, it might join us yet!

I am zone 5a, but I use strawberries as a groundcover, and they have been fantastic.  The everbearing kind keeps going from June through to November!  They make a very effective groundcover and have been my breakfast, mixed with cottage cheese, almost every day since June and we are headed into March as I write this.  

I would also suggest that you may want to plant some asparagus...obviously, it's not a berry, but I planted 50 crowns about four years ago, and while you have to be patient the first couple of years, you will have enough to be eating your fill in very short order. You could plant much less than that and still have a ton.  (I want to have enough so that I can bring the extra to the food shelf.)  You can then pickle, can, freeze-dry, whatever.  When it ferns out, it makes a pretty backdrop, almost like grasses, and provides a sense of privacy.  I planted the crowns behind my Regent serviceberries, which only grow to 4-6 feet.   The serviceberries are a beautiful berry because they go from pink to purple to black and are very colorful.  On their own, I find them rather one-dimensional in flavor, kind of sweet and watery, but their true value comes when mixed with other fruit.  I no longer need to add sugar; they sweeten up the blueberries or strawberries or whatever so sugar is not needed or missed. They do sucker, so that's a consideration.  I have a 120' line of them along the sidewalk. In bloom, they are a sight to behold!  Of course, the birds love them, and I love seeing the birds enjoying them, and with so many, I have enough to feel generous!

Within that front bed, I also have jostaberry which has not started to produce yet; hopefully, this summer they will start. I believe that they taste more of the gooseberry and not the muskiness of the black currant. (It is a cross between black currant and gooseberry, thornless), clove currants (beautiful yellow flowers in spring that smell like cloves and then fruit is black.  The shrub remains fairly small 4-6'?  I also have other colored currants--white, red, black and pink, along with gooseberries and honeyberries.  I did have some dwarf everbearing and Gerardi dwarf mulberries but was worried about the roots doing damage to the driveway, sidewalk or septic; I moved the four of them out back with some of the wilder looking things. Even though they are dwarf and the Gerardi only reaching 6' after ten years, when I checked with the people whom I bought them from, they, too, advised that I move them away.  I have yet to taste them but people do go on about them, so I'm excited to taste them. While not a berry, I also have rhubarb in the front bed.  I like it because the leaves are very dramatic, it stays put and is well-behaved and produces early in the season. I have small trees out there that will stay in the 10-20' range: quince, medlar and paw paw. I have some American persimmons, but they will get taller than that, but I was wondering if you could grow an Asian persimmon which stay rather small--the fruit is considered a berry, so that's why I put that in here.

So far, my favorite of those things mentioned would be the strawberries, with 2nd place being taken by the asparagus.  Of course, the garden is going on its fourth year and I have yet to taste a lot of what is to come!  I'm dying for the paw paws and persimmons to start fruiting...and the kiwi, hazelnuts, bush cherries and raspberries...That might be something you'd be interested in...I just discovered that there are thornless bush raspberries that only get to be about 2-3 foot tall and wide.  I got them through Stark Bros.  No crazy canes to deal with.  They are called Bushel and Barrel Raspberry Shortcake.  https://www.starkbros.com/products/berry-plants/raspberry-plants/bushel-and-berry-raspberry-shortcake
I'm wanting well-behaved plants and ones that don't require a huge regimen of care and these fit the bill.  

Mulberries are one of my favorites, though it isn't a true berry (don't tell anyone!). I'm not going to pay anyone for a root ball because the birds do all the transplanting around here in northern Indiana. Wait until the mulberry trees are dropping overripe fruit and the birds start eating them. Look for seedy, purple bird poop. Transplant the bird poop in a socially acceptable manner to the place you want the tree to grow. Plop. Studies have shown that mulberry seeds that have passed through a bird's gut have a much higher germination rate.

They grow pretty quickly, but I'm not sure how many years it takes for them to set fruit. I'm going to place some in my food garden this year, but honestly if I want a ton of free mulberries, all I have to do is wait until they're ripe, and ride my bike down the local bike trail to areas where they're plentiful. I can leave with purple hands and lips and a full belly, or enough to put up a gallon of preserves.  They're that abundant around here.

I also have a wild black raspberry bramble in my ditch, too, so I already have that going for me. Will be trying blueberries in a different part of the yard this year, as they haven't thrived where I originally put them three years ago.

j

S Rogers wrote:I'm working on adding some fruit to my urban homestead.  We want our "yard" to be full of food.  So we are trying out some fruit tree guilds and other intensive intercropping strategies.

So far I have an established italian plum tree, a very sad blackberry bush that may not be coming back, 2 raspberry bushes, a baby fig tree and a red currant bush.

I'd like to bring in mulberries, gooseberries and blueberries.

Do you have a favorite berry bush that works in zome 6a?  

I just re-read the post about wanting to try goji berries...they are quite brambly from what I've read, and yes, I believe they all have thorns, require a male and a female, and many say that they taste like tomatoes that are starting to rot...I would be leary of planting them.  I had them on my original "possible" list, but they were culled pretty quickly!  Here is a video that talks about them:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CYO34sUCBL0&t=328s  (Goji starts at about 4:30.)  Like he said, some people like them dried; I was at the local co op and tried some dried ones, and they were pretty good, but I don't know if they were sweetened or not.  Still, I think other fruit might be better.
I'd be curious to know how much acreage you have to work with; how close are your neighbors, are there any boundary lines or fences, do you have animals or even deer pressure?  What size is your family and how young are you--strength/ability to maintain some plants?

Barbara Simoes wrote:I just re-read the post about wanting to try goji berries...they are quite brambly from what I've read, and yes, I believe they all have thorns, require a male and a female, and many say that they taste like tomatoes that are starting to rot...I would be leary of planting them.  I had them on my original "possible" list, but they were culled pretty quickly!  Here is a video that talks about them:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CYO34sUCBL0&t=328s  (Goji starts at about 4:30.)  Like he said, some people like them dried; I was at the local co op and tried some dried ones, and they were pretty good, but I don't know if they were sweetened or not.  Still, I think other fruit might be better.

Goji thorns are small and not terribly hard- really a non-issue.  I can see where uncontrolled gojies could grow into a non-thorny morass (unlike blackberry brambles) that would be hard to walk through.  I grow my berries in a row and trimming back any attempts at spreading isn't hard.

I like James Prigioni, but I'll have to mostly disagree with his take on gojis.  Yes, fresh ones taste a little like tomatoes (but rotting???).  I don't particularly like them fresh.  However, they dry well and are significantly sweeter and tastier then.  James thinks that having to dry them is an issue, but I preserve a lot of fruit/veggies and gojies are fairly trivial to preserve for off-season eating.  Besides, the point of gojies isn't just taste.  If you want sugar-bombs, then grapes are more appropriate.  Gojies are reputed to have a lot of beneficial nutrients which is why I want them in the mix.

Bonus: My chickens love both the fresh berries and the leaves.  In fact, I have to protect new young gojies so that they can grow large enough to handle the leaf browsing.

This is good information; thank you.  The health benefits are what first attracted me to them, but then the description of the taste, the thorns and their ability to spread made me think otherwise.  I may have to look around for a spot...or, I might just get some at the co-op.  I feel like I'm running out of room!