How to transplant blackberry bushes

Transplanting Blackberry Bushes

I was surprised to find how easy transplanting blackberries is. They practically do it themselves. The plants sends out shoots underground which then pop up to the surface and create a new plant.

 Here you can see where I mulched, but a shoot still made its way to the surface and started growing a very healthy new blackberry bush. I will probably leave this one here since it is well spaced between my other plants and contained well to my garden bed.

 Here is another shoot that made its way up through the mulch.

       I should be honest and say that the reason I have so many shoots growing crazy in my garden is that I was very bad the summer before. I stopped weeding and then stopped keeping my blackberry branches from touching the ground. This is not the avenue which I would suggest. If you want to reproduce your bushes (the right way) just bury the end of a branch in the dirt, by the time spring comes around the next year you will have another plant growing. then you can just cut the branch you buried to separate.

 

This picture (above) shows a blackberry bush that has sent out a shoot underground and is now growing in the middle of my blackberry rows (among weeds) this guy needs to be moved so just take your shovel and dig a ring around the plant, separating any shoots that are not within about 4 inches of the main plant. Then you can pick up the plant using your shovel and transfer to your new hole. Check out my blog about planting blackberry bushes for info on preparing the site. /tips-for-planting-blackberry-bushes

This shows what my plant looked like that I transplanted in early spring, I then gave it some time to grow and it seems very happy in its new bed. The row I transplanted 2 weeks later is taking more time to adjust. 

Here is a row of transplanted bushes, they are small now but I have my trellis ready for them to grow much bigger soon.

This is my blackberry garden, last year I purchased and planted 3 blackberry bushes. Now I have 11 planted in beds. You can see I mulched the first row and then used straw for the other two rows. This is only for financial reasons. The mulch I had to buy, the straw was sitting in my barn. If given the choice I would prefer mulch.

I hope you enjoyed my tips, feel free to share, and make sure to check out the rest of my blog for gardening, recipes and more!