Berries are Nature's original superfoods! They're
loaded with vitamins; low in carbs for those looking to get 'the shine' and they're low in
fuss too! So you really should be growing them! Hi, I'm Ben and if you want to get more berries
into your diet without forking out a pretty penny at the grocery store, now's your chance to grow
them for free! Come on, let me show you how... First up is raspberries, which are one of the very
easiest soft fruits to grow because they virtually propagate themselves! They grow by sending
out shoots from their roots called 'suckers'. Some of these appear quite some distance from the
the main plant and we can take advantage of this by simply lifting them up to plant elsewhere. So
ideally we want to look for suckers that are at least about a foot or 30 centimetres from the main
plant so we don't damage it when we dig it up. Once we've identified that, it's just a question
of getting the fork under there and digging it up. And here we go- this is looking like a
really good sucker actually! Nice and strong! If it was attached to the main parent plant, I'd
just cut it free before digging it up. Obviously that bit there is dead wood. Now I'm going
to plant this into a hole exactly the same depth it was at before - so about here - and then
once I've done that, just trim it down to about 10 inches or 25 centimeters tall, making a
cut just above a bud at a slant - like that, there. And there we have it! Obviously keep this
well watered to help it establish - and this is very very important - only take suckers like
this from really healthy disease-free plants. That's important because you don't want to pass
on problems from one plant to the next. You can transplant suckers like this at any time of year
but autumn or early spring before the buds burst into leaf is best. Blueberries are a firm favorite
of any health-conscious fruit lover and in fact, winter is the ideal time to take hardwood
cuttings of many fruit garden staples. Now, this is my blueberry here which I planted last autumn
into a pot of acidic (or 'ericaceous') compost. It's put on quite a lot of new growth
since then and we can use some of that to propagate new plants. As you can see, the plant
here has still got quite a lot of leaves on it; autumn has been very late indeed here. And in fact
the very best time to take hardwood cuttings of blueberries is towards the end of winter, once the
plant has had a bit of a winter chilling period. But I'm going to take some cuttings now just to
demonstrate how to do that. So what we're looking for is good young stems like this - nice and
straight and strong. That's perfect. And you can tell the younger wood by the color of the stem;
either pale green or red and it's a lot lighter than the darker wood down here towards the base of
the plant. So all I'm going to do is just take my material here and then we'll trim them up shortly.
So we want to trim the cuttings down to about six inches or 15 centimeters in size. Before
we do that we're just going to sterilize our pruners or secateurs here using a mix of about
one part household bleach to five parts water, and that just makes sure we're not carrying
over any disease. Keep it nice and clean. Right, to trim them I'm going to cut just
below a leaf node - that's where the bud appears from - and cut a nice
straight cut across the bottom, like that. And then at the top of the cutting
I'm going to give a slightly slanted cut. What that does is, if I get mixed up, it means I know
which end is up - so that it doesn't get planted upside down by accident! Once you have your
cuttings it's time to pot them up and I'm using a really low-nutrient, free-draining mix here of
just coconut coir fibre and some perlite added in as well for really good drainage. You could
use, say, coarse sand, coir and pine bark for example - anything that gives a free-draining mix
and plenty of air at the roots - and that's what these cuttings need. I'm going to dip them into
this hormone rooting gel. They are also available as powders. It's not essential but it does up
the chances of the cuttings rooting successfully, so you may as well right?! So just dip them in and
then they're going in to about half their depth. Each little node that is underground
should eventually produce some roots, so getting about half the cutting in there ensures
that there's plenty of chance for root growth. I'm popping the cuttings in around the side of
the pot. This actually also helps with drainage and keeps the cuttings further apart from each
other so that their roots won't get too enmeshed. With them all done, I'm going to give them a
really good water. And then it's important to put them somewhere sheltered like a cold
frame for example or against the house. You need to keep them sheltered from very
strong sunshine in their first summer. Keep the potting medium nice and moist
here and then by the end of next autumn they should have roots on them and you should
be able to separate them out and plant them. Now is also the ideal time to take hardwood
cuttings of currants and gooseberries as well as many tree fruits like fig and mulberry and even
grape vines. And unlike blueberries, they can be taken at any time during the 'dormant season' -
so from autumn right through to the end of winter. This is a quiet time of year in the garden so if
you're itching to grow something, then this should keep you busy! Summer fruits are delicious but the
work starts now in winter and this is honestly one of the very easiest ways to start them off! I
brought you over here to show you these four blackcurrant bushes here. These were actually
taken from cuttings just three years ago and they've already started to form really good-sized
bushes. I'm actually quite confident they should flower and fruit very soon - perhaps as early
as next summer. Now, did you know that the vast majority of blackcurrants go into making fruit
cordials?! In fact something around 90 percent! But I think we should be eating currants in their
own right because they're delicious fruits, so I hope you're encouraged to give them a go! You
can take your hardwood cuttings at the same time as pruning your currants or gooseberries. Just use
the offcuts. I love it when nothing goes to waste like that! The ideal time to take your cuttings is
in mid-autumn, just after the leaves have fallen but you can wait until the end of winter, just
before they burst into leaf. Now, you want to take your cuttings from younger material and you can
tell that by the colour of the stem. These stems are a lot paler than the older wood further down
the bush here, so you know what to take. Ideally you want them about pencil thickness, so these
here absolutely perfect! Now let's trim them down to size. We want our cuttings about a foot or
30 centimeters in length. (Do make sure that your secateurs or pruners are properly sterilized
before doing all of this.) Cut just below a bud, giving a straight flat cut like that and
then cut the top at a slant just above a bud, making the slant just going away from the
bud. And what that does is it means there's less risk of water sort of congregating near
the bud and causing it to rot. And of course, it makes it easier to identify which end of
the cutting is up! Here we've got our prepared cuttings. So these ones are of blackcurrants.
They're a foot length as I said - ready to go! These ones here are gooseberries and what you want
to do with gooseberries as well as red currants and white currants is actually just pick off
these lower buds so that you leave just the top three or four buds. And the reason we do this
is that these plants grow on a short stem so that you have the the bush growth on a sort of
'leg' if you like; a clear stem. So do that with the gooseberries, red currants and white currants
- but the black currants, we leave as they are. When it comes to planting your cuttings, you've
got two options: in the ground or in pots. I'll show you how to do both methods, starting with
in the ground. Now, when they're in the ground you want an area that's got good, well-drained
soil. This had a compost heap on it recently so there's no need to add any more fertility
to it. It needs to be sheltered because you want them to have no stress or strain as
they're growing. So what I'm doing here is I'm just digging a little trench along the ground
and that's where the cuttings will go into the soil. Here it's pretty well-drained but just
to make absolutely sure I'm gonna add a little bit of coarse or sharp sand into the bottom of
the trench - here, like that - just tickle it in. And that'll just really help with drainage. If
your soil is quite heavy and it doesn't drain very well, then this I think is a very important step.
I've now just got to push the cuttings into place and they're going about half to two-thirds
deep and about six inches to a foot (that's 15 to 30 centimetres) apart, so they don't
grow into each other. The roots stay apart and then just firm them in, like that. These
will be left where they are, out of the way - and transplanted next autumn. If you don't have lots
of cuttings or you don't have much garden space to spare then they grow really well in pots. The
pots will need to be deep enough to accommodate the quite long cuttings, so something like this
is ideal. Fill it with a good mix of potting mix cut with, say, some coarse sharp sand
and that'll really help with drainage, like we've discussed before. So with the pot
filled, I just need to pop my cuttings in. Just push them down to about half to two-thirds
the depth of the cutting that might seem quite deep but there'll be roots coming along from those
nodes that are under the surface there. Again I'm putting them towards the edge of the pot so
that they aren't competing with each other. Lovely stuff! Now all I need to do is move this
somewhere sheltered; a greenhouse or cold frame again is ideal. Somewhere out of the worst of
the cold and that'll also help protect them from potential browsers like rabbits and deer. Keep it
well-watered again and then by next autumn they should be good to separate out and plant. You
may see some new growth by the end of spring. Here are some cuttings a few months after taking
them and if we remove them from their container you can see they've already produced some
roots. Leave your cuttings untouched though; you want them to remain in their pot or in the
ground where they are for at least a year before either carefully separating them out or digging
them up to transplant into their final growing positions. If they produce any flower buds before
this point, just pick them off to concentrate the young plant's energy on root formation.
And here are the cuttings about 16 months after taking them in the spring of their second
year. You can see how much growth they put on! They had a really fantastic root system by this
point. Holes were dug into prepared soil enriched with plenty of garden compost and the young
plants popped into place and firmed in. And here they are planted - that's a rhubarb in
the middle - and then again another year on. Don't forget that excess berries are easily frozen
so there's really no risk of going overboard when including these 'berry' good for you fruits in
your garden! Now, will you be using any of these methods to grow more berries and get them into
your garden? Join in the conversation down below! Just you wait till I tell you what we've
got coming up next time - a fabulous foray into the fantastic world of fungi! Homegrown
mushrooms? Yes sireee! You won't want to miss it so please make sure you're subscribed and have
turned on all notifications. Now if you want to bulk out your strawberry patch, do be sure to
check out this video. I'll catch you next time.
