Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Has anyone grown raspberries in an AP system, would be interested to know if is worth the space, and also, is any plant that grows and then goes into dormancy not worth the space of the grow bed

I'm sure they could be grown, but they would take up a lot of space for the number of berries you would get. Perhaps towers would be a good option.

On a side note, I was at the Microsoft campus last week, and they had yellow rasberries growing all over the place as a decorative ground cover. I did not know they came in yellow until I tried one. They had some other edibles growing also - just not ready for harvest. It was really pretty cool.

Raspberries grow on second year canes,so would need to be pruned and trained,as DjV mentioned it would take a fair amount of space.
I had a bed in Melbourne in the ground maybe 3 metres by .5 of a metre trained on wires and didn't get a great deal of berries, maybe a few handfuls.
Pro tip: the birds love them you will need netting

watch out DjV, you'll have to upgrade your digestive tract with a third party patch to allow passage of "yellowrassberries.exe", then configure norton to allow executables on the "empty "recycle bin" ( why is it called recycle ? )" to remove unwanted "code" if you ate something of microsoft gounds ...

DjV, have you tried some of the "other" berries? Marionberry (as described here), loganberry, or the like? Boy, they can be bigger than your thumb and just as juicy and sweet!

I am in love with my thornless blackberries. They don't sucker and come up everywhere like raspberries and the fuit is heavenly and so much of it from 2 plants in their 2nd year. Well worth growing if you can keep the birds off. Oh these are in the ground, I will be trying some more in a wicking bed in the future.

As for raspeberries in your AP system, well from what I have read anything with a large root system is going to cause problems with stagnant areas of water, clogging up pipe works with roots. However I have seen a dvd with a pawpaw tree growing in one and it was fine and so was the system so not sure about it. Raspberries can be quite prickly so you would want to have safe access to the bed or getting passed it.
Good luck with it though
Dale

Hmmm thanks guys and I suppose for the room they take it may not be worth it, but hey Tassy is the best berry growing place, have a nice little blueberry coming on as well, in the ground though, birds are always a pest with any fruit, might need to net to get a good crop

Try talking to KudaPucat, I think here tried it last year.

regards
Matt

Could you possibly pull them out of the growbed when dormant and store with a damp bag around the roots over winter, and then replant just before bud burst
Then the bed could be used for something else in winter

Hmmm not sure but I have planted one to give it a try

Have also planted from the dirt bed one half grown lettuce and a mature kale plant and they did not even know they had been moved, just the first day I covered them so the sun would not wilt them

I have a thornless blackberry growing in AP which does well,I did have a youngberry growing in it as well which produced lots of fruit but it kind of took the place over and I was ordered to get rid of it.

Here's some raspberry cuttings striking in the "Holmes-a-Court" system...







And they look even better today...

Not Raspberries, boysenberries... got a few off the vine. I have a thornless blackberry (non-viable seeds) also to try this year.
You can get a raspberry that grows like a blackberry, and I think theis would be a better option than canes, but hey give it a shot, see where you get to.

I have both thornless blackberries and rasberries this year. the b/berries are flowering and setting fruit now and the rasberries are still shooting. I have 2 varieties of rasberries, an early and a late fruiting. interesting to see how it goes. I think if you maintain it and chop it down each year, leaving the canes that will fruit the following year, then it should be fine. also every couple of years, thin it out an transfer to the ground or give away to other people. I have the berries training over an arbour and the aim is to keep them in that area. time will tell, but looks like the b.berrie is happy so hopefully the r.berries will also be happy.

Be advised: 2 attempts at growing blueberries have failed dismally.
Good luck, and keep me posted with regard to raspberries. I'm most interested.