Among the many exciting discoveries on our new property, a brambley, thorny, cane type plant was ID'd by the Name that Plant forum in GardenWeb as a wild blackberry.  YAY!

 

It's in bloom now, and some blooms have fallen and I can see the start of berries.

It's located between a major granite boulder and our concrete driveway.  It can't spread far.

Any advice as to it's needs and care?  The only water it gets is from the dripper on the Palm Tree that it has surrounded.

Suzi

I love to eat blackberries and raspberries. There are many patches that are loaded with berries on 30 mile bicycling route I do weekly or more thru north Bergen county here in NJ. I fill my face with them every chance I get.
I'm sure you could find " blackberry care" .edu papers on google.

Blackberries are easy.  Hit it with some balanced fertilizer now, put some bark or other mulch down to help keep moisture consistent and watch it take off.

Thanks Calvin!  This property has been so much fun.  Almost every day is a new discovery!  Last week we found that an unknown native tree just happens to be a wild cherry that is totally edible!  And today this Blackberry gift. 

I will hit it with a balanced fertilizer, and will be looking for some thornless berries to plant under one of the pine groves.  Been reading up on Blackberries, and they grow wild under pines in many places.  Not much else does, but there is a lot of sun under our pines.  So partial shade basically.

JD's B'day is this week, and he has a chipper coming, so good mulch is on it's way!  He's got piles of tree and bush limbs to chip up for mulch.

Rich, when I was young, my family always went camping, and I'll never forget Daddy pulling over so we could pick wild blackberries!  YUM!

Suzi

Hey Suzi.

Wild blackberries are always nice. There are so many that grow down near the creeks and bottoms in my area. The wild ones seem to have the most intense flavor but the thornless ones are nice because you can pick freely from them without getting scratches all over.

If you ever come across the Kiowa variety, I'd recommend picking up a few plants. They are a thorned variety but the berries are quite possibly the largest of all blackberries. The flavor also comes closer to the wild types. I can attest to both the berry size as well as the flavor. One of the best! I only have two plants of that one right now or I'd be happy to share. If you'd like to look into ordering some, I think Edible Landscaping carries Kiowa.

If you'd like to try the Arapaho thornless variety shoot me an email and we'll talk about it.

There are many other thornless varieties out there that are just great too. Some are relatively new on the scene and of those, some are reported to have greatly improved flavor over some of the others.

I have this one variety that someone gave me. I don't know the variety for sure but I like it best out of the three thornless vars I have. He said it might be either Prime Jim or Prime Jan -?

Many good ones around to choose from though.

Blackberries are also considered to be one of those "super foods" that are very good (even medicinal) for the human body & mind. As are figs ;-).

Triple Crown Thornless blackberries are incredible.

Suzi, I must have watched every video on Blackberries and other berries. I think these are very simple and easy to follow and understand how these plants grow and produce.  Hope this will help you.  I enjoy the wild berries in my city block, but am working on my new baby triple crown.

Hi desertdance,
Blackberries are easy to grow when you know how to .
I wouldn't use mulch on blackberries .
The reason is easy to understand : Blackberry's cycle if done in two years ; first year the cane grows, second year it fruits and dies , so you have to let new canes come out of the dirt and espalier them - if you cut the shoots, then no or less fruit next year.

I wouldn't keep those wild bb, because they are too close to the dirt - and so sorry to tell but you need to know- and so foxes ... and dogs tend to "put the leg up" on them.
Here they say to never harvest anything under the height of 50 cm or even a meter is better - but everyone does as they feel comfortable with ...

I have 3 bb, and unknown with thorn, an unknown thornless, and a thornless "Jumbo" BB .
The big problem with bb are the stains on clothes and tongue/teeth so I tested Muroisiers/loganberry and those have my preference now - just suggesting .
The other problem with bb is with rainy weather when getting ripe - they'll then get really sour.

As for care, they need water to grow well - an 11L watering can per week and some manure/fertilizer and they are happy .

When we moved to KY we had lots of wild blackberries around where we put the building. I wanted to leave them for the birds... but! The default setting for snake was copperhead. We had lots of them, and big ones. I tried relocating them and when I tossed one into a blackberry thicket I finally figured out what was going on. It disappeared with me staring right at it. They are perfectly camouflaged to hide in blackberry leaf litter. They were getting fat ambushing the birds that were eating the blackberries. The vast majority of snakebite cases in the South happen to people picking wild blackberries. Your hand is about the size of a bird. Okay? Another reason for not picking the low handing fruit. The wife found herself within striking distance a couple of times and I had to mow the brambles. If the cook ain't happy, ain't nobody happy! I mulch my raspberries with straw, keep them staked up, and don't let leaf litter build up under them. We hardly ever see a copperhead anymore, now a-days it's mostly king-snakes, which eat copperheads.

BTW, you can get about four times the production, from raspberries, by pruning the first year canes so that they branch more for when they set fruit in the second year. I expect that would work for blackberries too.

If it were me, I would go with one of the newer cultivars. I have 3 different ones in my yard and they are SO much better than the wild ones I grew up eating. Also, the thornless are very nice on the hands.

Also, I would disagree with the poster who said not to mulch. I use 2-3 in layer mulch on mine because of water conservation. If blackberries don't get enough water during fruiting they produce small, shriveled fruits. 

I'll let it bear fruit, pick the fruit, and if we like it, it can stay.  You have all been very helpful!  This property is so big, there is room for more "known" thornless varieties in other spots.

That's kinda creepy about the snakes and the fox pee.  I've never seen a fox, but we have plenty of snakes .  The rattler is the only poisonous one, and I've only seen one so far.  Ours tend to hide in the cracks of the boulders.  Amazing how they can squeeze into tiny cracks and disappear.

The videos were great, Grasa!

Thanks everyone!