Pruning Wild Raspberries

I have quite a few wild raspberries and high bush cranberries on our property. They are mostly intertwined with some other very thick shrubby non food producing bushes. I would like the berries to thrive and the non-food bushes to… not. I started cutting back the bushes around the berries. I am wondering the best way to keep the unwanted bushes at bay and the berries thriving? Any input?

I wish I had your problem.  I love wild berries.

Maybe borrowing some goats to help out though the goats will not choose which plants to eat.

Maybe cutting the offending plants at the based and waiting for them to die might make it easier to spot them and pull them out.

What kind of tools are you using?

A lot of folks on the forum like the Hori Hori knife.

Doe you have a long handled weed puller?

I usually just use a garden hoe and rose bush pruners.

I’ve just been using loppers to cut back the bushes around them as close to the base as possible. Hopefully this doesn’t make them come back more vigorously in the spring… I don’t know what else to do. Is there any way that raspberries or cranberries can be pruned in fall to produce better the following summer? I’d like to give them the best shot at out competing the other bushes. The other bushes seem very good at strangling, and are very thick. The berries tend to be only one or two stalks. I’d love to help them bush out more next year. But I don’t have any experience pruning berries.