Soft Summer fruit

The great thing about summer pudding is it allows you to use whatever soft fruit you have at the time.  But how do you know which fruits are your soft options?

Soft fruit is the sort that grows on bushes, canescanes and herbaceous plants.   The other type is top fruit, that grow on tress.  So strawberries, red currents, blackcurrents, gooseberries and others are soft fruit.  Plums, apples, pears, cherries and peaches are top fruit.

You can enjoy home grown soft fruit throughout the winter, as it is easy to freeze and, a few hours later, box them up.

Soft fruit bushes will crop for many years, so it makes good sense to buy the best quality.

Soft fruit gives one of the best returns from the garden, providing large crops of fruit that are expensive to buy in the supermarket.  No matter how small you plot is there is room for some soft fruit, a redcurrent or blackberry trained on the side of your shed.

Raspberries

A row of raspberries will produce good crops for 12 or more years.

A row containing an early, a mid - and a late season variety, plus an Autum fruiting one, will give a continious supply from June to November.  Raspberries produce masses of fruit, over a pound for each foot of row every season.

Blackberry

A thornless blackberry in an odd corner provides masses of fruit year in and year out.  Cut down the old canes after harvest and tie in the new.

Blackcurrants

Blackcurrents are nutricious, have a strong flavour and are excellant in jams.  Prune them after fruiting by cutting out the stems with the darkest with the darkest bark.

Gooseberries

One of the few fruits that can be harvested before they ripen.  Grow as a bush or train against a wall.  Mildew is a problem, so try to select a mildew-resistant variety.  In May inspect the bushes regularly for gooseberry sawfly.  Prune in a similar way to redcurrent., cutting back any weak growth to the point of origin.

Red and White Currents

A white current is a variety of red current.  So the bush needs exactly the same care.  Grow as a bush or train against a wall.  Currents are easy to prune as fruit is borne on both old and new wood. Prune in winter by cutting back the leaders by half the previous year's growth.  Shorten side growth by 2 inches long.  Remove any growth from the middle of the bush to maintain an open goblet shape.