I've been doing some reading on growing raspberries, blackberries, and blueberries. Nearly every source says that raspberries and blackberries should be grown at least a few hundred feet from one another due to some air-borne diseases that they can give one another.
My yard is big, but not that big, so I have to pick one. Based on what I read about ability to grow them in my area and given the locations I have to work with, the choice seemed fairly easy: blackberries win, and they'll be grown in a location away from the main garden:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/wm5j1y1uhkjrb9f/blackberry_location.png?dl=0
The pic above was taken from the back corner of my yard a few minutes ago. I'm going to put a simple twine lattice up on the back side of the deck that you can see. The deck (not including the stairs) is 16 feet across, and it's 6 feet from the ground to the bottom of the deck. I'll let the blackberries climb the lattice in that area.
Blueberries thrive in soil even more acidic than the 5.8 pH I have outside of the garden area. 5.0 to 5.5 is listed as the ideal range for them, so I'm going to create a bed a few feet up the yard from the existing main garden bed for them. I'm thinking one row of five bushes.
COMPOST
I'm continuing to move the piles farther up the beds as I turn them so it won't be as much work to spread it all when the time comes. Pile 3 is almost at the top of the bed now. I haven't turned the other two in a week, but expect to do so this afternoon. Here's an update on the piles:
PILE # | BUILD DATE | LAST MATERIAL ADDED | LOCATION | LATEST TEMP | LATEST TURN | COMMENTS |
1819-1 | 9/2/2018 | 10/29/2018 | main bed, bottom | 126 | 12/2 | Looking like mostly dirt, but based on temp, clearly is still active. |
1819-2 | 10/2/2018 | 10/29/2018 | main bed, middle | 133 | 11/26 | Also mostly dirt-like, but with observable leaves in particular still breaking down |
1819-3 | 11/5/2018 | 11/5/2018 | main bed, top | 145 | 11/26 | When I started turning it this morning, there were pockets of dry leaves that appeared to have not decomposed at all, so I watered each layer as I turned it. |
1819-4 | 11/24/2018 | ongoing additions | back corner of yard | 130 | 11/26 | Hoping I won't need anything from this one until I'm planting the first fall crops in July-ish 2019. Assuming the temp is low because right now it's not big enough to get hot. |
I also suspect that pile 3 is lacking enough nitrogen; when I built it, there simply wasn't as much grass available, and I haven't been able to use the van to get copious amounts of used coffee grounds lately because my wife has had it pretty much constantly filled with presents for foster kids. (Yeah, can't fuss at her about that...) The last of the foster kid Christmas events is this Thursday, so I hope to add more nitrogen next weekend.