I went berry crazy as well; got about 4 blueberry plants, 3 gooseberries and 8 raspberries and several other kinds of berries. You could easily grow blueberries.... just grow them in medium sized pots with conditioned potting soil. I am growing mine in peat moss mix with a blueberry soil acid additive.

I think ALL of the estimates of number of plants are very low. I guess it depends upon your family's tastes and use of fruits. Years ago, my mother used to grow strawberries to sell at her parents' farm stand. People would come up and say they were having 12 people over for dinner, serving strawberry shortcake, and so they needed one quart of berries. We prepare a quart PER PERSON in my family.

I have 2 100' x 4' blocks of strawberries, 2 100' blocks of raspberries, 12 mature blueberry bushes, about 40' of a block of blackberries, about 10 currants, 4 or 5 gooseberries, 5 big clumps of rhubarb, 12 grapevines on individual arbors, a rampant, out of control patch of kiwis, not to mention lots of other stuff. This gives me plenty to freeze for the household, as well as to give to relatives and friends.

Currants are fabulous for pies, jelly -- kinda similar in flavor to sour cherry or cranberry -- sort of a similar sweet-tart flavor. I love them fresh, although they're too tart for most people.

I think its better to have more, because some years, yields will be very poor due to weather, etc.

I agree with Denn -- if you want to grow more than a couple berries for your cereal topping then a significant area is required. I had 20' of blackberries but that was not enough so I doubled it to 40' last year. I had 6 blueberries and doubled that to 12 and wish I had room for more. I had 30'x10' of strawberries and that was also not enough (the maintenance was also too much and so I'm taking a break from strawberries now). I had plenty for cereal, and maybe a pie or two, but I was far, far away from putting any away. If you don't have enough room I would limit the kinds of berries you grow. The currants grow well with only 3-4 hours of sun per day which gives a few more options. I just started a new currants bed this year in a lower-light spot - 60' worth of red and black currants and gooseberries.

Scott

I'm fairly new to the fruit forum, but have grown small fruits/berries for a number of years and picked strawberries since I was a tot. Yummmm.

A couple of things to consider:

1) Are these recommendations for getting started, or for production? B/c strawberries and raspberries will runner and propagate themselves given a few years. Blackberries are easy to layer, and if you damage a root, you'll get plenty of starts in places you may not want. Bottom line, some will spread/propagate off of what you buy. It's a matter of how long you want to wait to get your berry garden up to the size you want. If you want a 100' bed of berries, don't just buy 50 plants, etc.

2) You allude to a good point, and one I wish I had paid more attention to when buying fruit trees: timing different fruits for a successive harvest. It does two things for you: keeps you in supply of fresh fruits througout the summer (or at least extends the season), and spreads out the work, so you don't have to harvest and store (and eat) everything all at once. While it may not be possible to have fresh fruit always in production for every day, and some overlap is inevitable, it is something to aim for.

Scott & Denn, I cannot imagine 40' of blackberries. I have about 15'-20', and it is wayyy more than our family of 6 can handle. (But the children did well with them at the local farmer's market). But we don't eat them fresh as well as the raspberries, which we cannot even harvest a cup of for a dessert, as the children eat them faster than they can produce! Guess each family has to look at what they like and go from there!

Best wishes!
Mark

Catherine- Make your plans flexible. Every year will bring new successes and failures. An evolutionary approach is critical for long term success. Start with low risk high reward plants. Personally, I would rate blackberries as the best of the bunch you mentioned. Good luck.

4 blueberry plants aren't enough for one person, much less a family with kids. Get more!!! Same with the strawberries - one bundle of 25 plants ain't enough!
Anything else will be very dependent upon your own tastes. I'd plant more blackberries, keep the 4 gooseberries, and wouldn't waste ANY space on the raspberries(YUK! but that's just my flavor preference) or the elderberries; currants, I don't know - I have some growing, but none have fruited yet.

Raspberries and strawberries quickly spread so those numbers sound fine to me. I agree that strawberries as I have tried to grow them are too much work, though I've heard others speak of labor-saving methods. Strawberries don't compete with weeds at all well.

Currants and gooseberries also send out branches that can be easily rooted by covering partly with soil so you can stick with just a few and propigate more if you want to.

Blackberries take a lot of per plant room so eight sounds like an excellent start but you should definately order at least another 4 blueberries and make sure that 2 of them are Elliots because their very late bearing habit extends your season. Make sure the others are devided between early and mid-season bearers.

I have grown all the types you mention but now only bother with blueberries and black currants because my tree fruit demands so much attention. I still maintain a few Heritage raspberries but the other brambles suffer too much from virus and other diseases here to keep in one spot very long. I can't be bothered replanting every 5 years when my tree fruit gives me so much more bang for my buck for many reasons.