Tayberries
Introduction
A tayberry is a cross between a raspberry and a blackberry. It is a marvellous mixture combining the size of a big raspberry with the sweetness and juiciness of a blackberry.
Tayberries are much more restrained than blackberries in their spreading habits. Where as blackberries can spread, if uncontrolled, all over a plot, tayberries are much easier to manage with mostly spine free canes and the absence of runners.
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Planting
- Planting depth: cover root ball
- Planting spacing: 2 m apart in all directions
Harvesting
- Leave the stem on when picking (similar to strawberries)
- Tayberries can be enjoyed freshly picked, but are outstanding when cooked and turned into compote and jam
- Alternatively, tayberries freeze well
(inside)
(outside)
(fresh)
(stored)
= jar, = freeze, 
= store
Varieties
Tayberries are sweet when fully ripe, but if not they can be a little tart, and are not as easy to eat fresh as raspberries. Where tayberries come into their own is for cooking. With a little added sugar, tayberries make absolutely delicious compote, jam, and other cooked desserts.
There is seldom a range of tayberry varieties to purchase in shops. Typically, a shop will stock one variety. Instead, shops will offer a range of similar fruit bushes like blackberry, boysenberry, and raspberries.
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Growing
Tayberries are a hardy plant originating from Scotland and are easy to grow. They have very few pests and diseases, and flower late, meaning that the harvest is rarely damaged by a late frost.
It is hard to give tayberries too rich a start in life. A tayberry bush should last for many years in a garden or plot, so it is worth mixing a significant proportion of well rotted compost and manure into its planting hole. Every year apply a good mulch of the same to feed the plant and help keep the roots moist.
The best time to plant tayberries is in their dormant period, either in autumn or early spring. To propagate tayberries, bury a tip of a cane into the ground during summer. It will naturally root, and can be cut away from the parent plant when new growth emerges a few weeks later.
Tayberries are grown like summer raspberries, and this means the gardener needs to be patient in the first year after planting. Assuming a tayberry bush is planted just before or after winter, the following spring the plant will send up fresh new canes that will need to be supported. Next summer these canes will produce the harvest. After fruiting in the second year they can be cut down to ground level, and in their place are tied in the new canes grown that summer, and the cycle continues.
The best shape to support tayberries is a fan. This is because the tayberry bush will naturally throw out canes into this shape, and the canes are a little stiff to try and bend to run along horizontal wires. The fan shape will be big. At my allotment I support my tayberry canes with posts and wire over 2m high and 3 m wide, and my mature bush easily fills this space. I even cut the end off my canes to stop them spreading further.
Watch out for the flowers of tayberries, not because they are particularly beautiful, but as a sign that the fruit will soon start to form. Tayberries taste delicious, and if birds discover this, there is a risk of losing the entire crop. A net is an essential defence.