|
Post by macmex on Aug 15, 2022 12:17:52 GMT -6
Saturday I went over to Ron's to get some elderberries. He has a good crop this year! Some of his "bushes" are spectacular, due to their size and production.
Here's a photo of Ron when we started picking.
I got starts from Ron this last spring. In spite of the brutal heat and drought this summer, I believe we're going to have a good may survivors.
|
|
|
Post by heavyhitterokra on Aug 15, 2022 14:15:06 GMT -6
I never realized that bush was so tall until I saw that photo. Those berries just make a person happy to see them. Elderberry bushes are very giving plants. I have the twin to that bush up by the house. I walk by it and nab berries every morning on my way to the chicken house.
|
|
|
Post by woodeye on Aug 15, 2022 14:30:27 GMT -6
I've had people ask me if I know of any place around here to find some elderberries, and I'm sure there's some growing in the county someplace, but I haven't ever seen any. Sure looks like a lot of elderberries hanging there. I think your elderberry bushes want to be trees...
|
|
|
Post by heavyhitterokra on Aug 17, 2022 10:47:07 GMT -6
Elderberries are super easy to propagate. Just find a bush in the wild that has good production and take note of where it is, then come back in February, when the buds first begin to swell with life and take a few cuttings from finger diameter wood, leaving three or four nodes of buds on each cutting. Then take them home, punch a hole in the ground with a metal rod slightly larger than the diameter of the cutting, drop the cutting into the hole, up to the second set of beds, burying the first set of buds. Tamp the soil back in around the cutting and let nature take its course.
They will just idle the first season, but the second season, look out! They grow like crazy! Mine grew as high as 12' feet that second season. Last year, I harvested 95 pounds of berries before I just called it quits because I ran out of space to store them. This year was slim pickings though, because of drought and grasshoppers, but there were still plenty to share with friends. George and I picked two-5-gallon buckets full, packed down, and running over. I think that was maybe three or four bushes worth. I have about a hundred bushes.
A note to anyone who wants to try elderberries on a grand scale: I planted mine on 8' foot centers both directions in a field 10 plants long, by 8 plants wide. That was not nearly far enough apart. They overlapped like crazy, making it nearly impossible to mow. If I had it to do over again, I'd plant three hedgerows about 4' feet between plants, about 12' to 15' feet between rows. They grow a lot bigger than I thought they would.
|
|
|
Post by woodeye on Aug 17, 2022 11:00:56 GMT -6
Good info! heavyhitterokra I copied and pasted your instructions into Evernote, will come in very handy later on, just like the pawpaw tree info you posted. Thank You...
|
|
|
Post by hmoosek on Aug 17, 2022 12:31:47 GMT -6
I’m taking notes on this also! Do they need full sun, partial shade or what?
|
|
|
Post by chrysanthemum on Aug 17, 2022 12:57:49 GMT -6
|
|
|
Post by heavyhitterokra on Aug 18, 2022 13:15:02 GMT -6
Elderberries grow just fine in partial sunlight/partial shade. I think that's why I see so many of them at the edge of wooded areas, but they also do very well in full sunlight. I think the bushes in full sunlight produce bigger berries though.
Deer love to eat elderberry bushes. They are very rough on the younger plants, but elderberries are so resilient that once they take root, they usually survive the deer damage. I have quite a few planted inside a 6' foot chain link enclosure. They grew very quickly, due to a lack of deer pressure. I also have a few elderberry plants outside the enclosure. They grew very slowly, due to heavy deer pressure, but eventually outgrew the deer and are fairing very well now. It just took several years for them to finally produce more foliage than the deer could eat. the deer seem to prefer the foliage to the berries, but I've seen deer walking on their hind legs trying to reach both. They steal my apples as high as they can reach, which is considerably high, but seem to leave most of the peaches alone.
I saw a deer eating a peach a few days ago, then I saw it curling its upper lip, trying to get the peach fuzz off of its nose. I don't think they like the fuzz much. Also, grasshoppers murder my apple trees, defoliating them completely, even eating the bark off of the twigs, sometimes killing my trees, but they don't eat peach leaves. They will eat elderberry leaves, but just as a last resort.
|
|
|
Post by chrysanthemum on Aug 18, 2022 14:40:22 GMT -6
That picture of the deer curling its upper lip because of peach fuzz gave me a chuckle. I don’t really like peach fuzz myself, I admit, but a good peach is worth it. I wonder if deer feel the same way.
I had suspected that young elderberries might be in danger. I have a spot where I’d love to plant a couple, but anything I plant, I’d have to protect from deer. I’ve discovered also that even if they don’t eat it, they may well rub it. That happened to one of my young olives, and it got broken off severely. That was a sad day around here, and ever since then our olives have been protected. One still got eaten even through the protection, though, and then the wire cage got ripped off and carried away several hundred feet. We replaced that cage with one with smaller mesh, and the poor little tree is coming back. My poor olives have had hard lives so far.
|
|
|
Post by heavyhitterokra on Aug 18, 2022 20:59:36 GMT -6
It's a battle to grow anything around here. We have deer out the wazoo. I guess I just ought to be glad they aren't buffalo.
|
|
|
Post by woodeye on Aug 19, 2022 8:36:58 GMT -6
It's a battle to grow anything around here. We have deer out the wazoo. I guess I ought to just be glad they aren't buffalo. Agree with that. I've seen 5 wire 6' steel post fences flattened to the ground from a buffalo stampede, looked like a Cat D-9 ran over it. And that was back when steel posts were well made, were much heavier made than the ones made nowadays. Was not acceptable, nor pretty...
|
|
|
Post by heavyhitterokra on Mar 21, 2023 13:34:46 GMT -6
I've got a massive job of pruning left to do on my elderberry bushes this year. If I remember correctly, I started my canes from wild berry cuttings in 2018. I think I enlarged my field from 6 plantings in 2018 to about 70 plantings in 2020.
Now, after a few years of neglect, it's time to get serious about pruning the heck out of them. My bushes are 15' feet tall and 8' feet wide right now. When I'm done pruning them, they ought to be about 2 feet tall, mostly so I can mow between my rows this summer.
Here is a video of how I plan to do that, though I'll probably be using a chainsaw.Just another pruning video. Below, is my neighbor from 360 Farms, who has 7,000 elderberry plants. I only have 70 (thank goodness).
|
|