One of the most favorite bushes of people is raspberry.
When spring begins, raspberries need care in order to continue to delight you with their harvest of delicious berries.
How to care for raspberries?
Water the bushes regularly
Most of the roots are in the upper soil layer. Therefore, during drought, raspberries need to be thoroughly moistened.
Do not forget to water the bushes during flowering, growth and ripening of berries. Consider the weather conditions. The soil should be moist.
Don't forget to add fertilizer to ensure your raspberries grow well.
If you fed the raspberries in the fall, then you don’t need to add fertilizer at the beginning of spring.
Before the raspberries begin to bloom, at the end of May, you can feed the raspberries with microelements.
Use complex nitrogen-containing fertilizers. Or use 5 kg of humus per 1 m2, dissolve chicken manure with water in a ratio of 1 to 20 or mullein with water in a ratio of 1 to 10.
Don't forget to add 60 grams of superphosphate and 30 grams of potassium sulfate.
Don't forget to mulch the soil under the bushes.
To protect the roots from frost, you need to lay mulch under the bushes. Thanks to mulch, moisture will be retained in the soil.
The bushes are mulched after applying mineral fertilizers.
This can be done with peat, sunflower husks, straw pus, sawdust or small branches. The mulching layer is 5 cm, if the soil is not mulched, you need to loosen the soil from time to time.
Don't forget about pruning and shaping the bushes
Perform sanitary pruning in early March. Cut off damaged, dry and frozen branches. Leave 15 to 20 healthy branches per 1 m2. In order to collect berries at different times, prune the bushes at different heights. The difference between branches can be 10–15 cm.
The remontant variety is pruned in spring. To get a single harvest and to make it abundant, cut off the branches completely, leaving no stumps. If you plan to harvest twice, leave shoots up to 25 cm high.
Spring treatment against diseases and pests
Before carrying out the treatment, carefully examine the branches. Thickenings on the branches may indicate a place where pests are wintering. Such branches should be carefully cut off and burned. Then spray with a 1% solution of Bordeaux mixture. Do not forget to loosen the soil and spray it.
To combat anthracnose, use Prognoz, Chistoflor or Agrolikare. To combat gray mold, use Fitosporin or a 3% solution of Bordeaux mixture.
For rust, use Baktofit, Topaz, and Abiga-Peak. For stem fly and raspberry beetle, use Askru, Fitoverm, and Kinmiks. For spider mites, use Antikleshch and Fitoverm. For raspberry gall midge, cut off branches, dig up the soil, and spray with Fufinon-Nova. 200 ml of solution is enough for a bush (add 20 ml of the product to a bucket of water).
To avoid missing the disease, inspect raspberry bushes in a timely manner.
