Thursday, April 16, 2015

Pruning currant and gooseberry bushes

Version française

We had a very sunny, warm day, yesterday, and I took this opportunity to prune currant and gooseberry bushes. 

Pink currant Champagne




Gooseberry Invicta as it will be later on in the season

Currants and gooseberries are very forgiving, and if you did not prune them at all, they will still produce, but not as much. As a child, I remember going to a summer camp where there was a very old and large patch of black currants that had probably not been pruned in decades. I would creep under the canes to get to a small clearing in the middle of the patch where no one could find me and where I would eat all the black currants I wanted. I thought it was heaven. Perhaps that is where my love of currants comes from!

Old brown canes to be removed - you keep the young grey ones
What you want to do when you prune currants is to remove the oldest canes (those that are 4 years old or more). It is easy to see which are the oldest. They are thicker than the others and tend to be brown (canes from last year are a very pale grey whereas the smaller brown ones might be 2 or 3 years ago.

One and two year old canes - the most productive

Unless you want to shape the bush, you do not shorten canes but remove them all together. Looking at them carefully, it becomes obvious which ones are the oldest and need to be removed. As I said, they are very forgiving. If you cut the wrong canes, you will simply get less fruit.

Leaf mulch and cuttings


Once I have finished pruning, I spread a leaf mulch on the ground. It prevents the soil from drying out and serves as fertilizer at the same time. I add a thick layer of leaves each spring, but by the following spring they have all broken down in the soil. I also save bits of the discarded canes to make cuttings. Usually I give them away once they have rooted. Some canes fall down and produce layering on their own. These I cut off  from the mother plant and also pot up.

Gooseberry canes are very thorny


Gooseberry bushes are treated exactly the same way. However, they are very prickly, and they seem to grow in a tangle which is more difficult to control. Because they have a tendency to root quickly where they touch the ground, they are always spreading outside their allotted space. As you can see, I don't like handling them.



With all these black currants I make a black currant liqueur and black currant jam, my favorite. You sometimes can buy real black currant jam, but it is pretty diluted stuff, and there is no comparison with home-made black currant jam, a completely different thing!



18 comments:

  1. A useful post. I am ashamed to say, I never get round to pruning mine and they are rather a tangled mess. When do you prune them?

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    1. I pruned mine last week but that would be too late for your climate. The best time would be before the buds break out in spring or when the leaves have fallen in autumn.

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  2. I prune my gooseberries and currants in late autumn, ours are in flower now.

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    1. It would be nice to have it already all done when spring comes. I see why you do it in autumn. Here I would have to do an other small pruning in the spring anyhow to remove canes broken by the snow and I have more energy in the spring!

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  3. That jam looks great, and I imagine the liqueur is quite tasty! Your description of hiding in the currant canes sounds like a sweet memory. :) I'm a big fan of foraging. We have plentiful black raspberries and mulberries up at our cottage, and I frequently pick enough to make several desserts (maybe I should make some jam this year). Nothing better than fresh-picked, home-grown, organic berries!

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    1. I am also a big fan of foraging however what we forage for around here is apples! There are many apple trees along the road which no one pick. Most are not very good but a few are delicious.

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  4. I've messed with currants and goose berries for years. Now I know what to do. thanks.

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  5. I bet you looked a proper mess after hiding under the canes and eating all those berries! I have a few gooseberry bushes to plant this year and I am wondering if it's possible to grow them as an informal hedge on account of their tangliness. What do you think?

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    1. I am sure it would work fine, especially since they easily root when a cane touches the soil. You could help it by putting a few canes under stones and very soon you would have an impenetrable hedge. They are very thorny.

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    2. Excellent! I will give it a try.

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  6. I found this helpful as I'm never sure how to go about pruning fruit bushes. I would never have thought to take cuttings either, I must try that!
    Ah, you can NEVER have enough jam!xxx

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  7. Hello Alain, thanks for this post, I will file it away for reference as although we don't have currant and fruit bushes at the moment, the border space is marked out for them and I hope to have the ground prepared this year, ready for planting, then we'll be able to enjoy whatever the birds deign to leave us!

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  8. We usually prune our blackcurrant bushes by taking out the branches that have just had fruit on them, so they are pruned at picking time. Redcurrants and gooseberries, I try to remember to prune them at more or less the same time as the fruit forms so early, we have mini gooseberries at the moment and the red currant bushes are full of flowers, so its just as well they were pruned last year.

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  9. Alain, I love home made currant jam as well. You're right it's completely different thing!
    I do pruning in autumn and now in spring I always cut the frozen or sick ends.

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  10. Alain ... I loved your story of finding that perfect hiding place and enjoying the fruit all by yourself : ) my type of heaven too!
    I wish they could breed them without those thorns and prickles ... now wouldn't that be much better ? LOL
    I don't grow any fruit canes here .. but hearing and seeing your experiences (especially the home made treasures) makes me wonder ? ;-)
    Joy

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  11. How I wish I had read this post before I pruned mine! I just charged in and shaped the whole bush, never checking the right way to do it ! That'll teach me !

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  12. Black currant jam is my absolute favourite. I have both red and black currant bushes. The red always does well, but the black one rarely produces a decent amount of fruit. Both kinds are in the same bed, so I am not sure why this is happening. Any ideas? I am thinking of moving them this year, so I think I may give them a good prune before I do so.

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    1. It is funny because it is the opposite here. The black tend to do better than the red. Both are supposed to benefit a lot from liquid fertilizer, or manure tea. You could try that. Besides, the roots do not like to be dry. A mulch helps a lot. Good luck with them.

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