Formosan raspberry

Photo: peganum from Henfield, England — CC BY-SA 2.0 · source

Survives zone 8 through 9

Harvest calendar

Best planted in early spring after your last frost, or in fall before the ground freezes, depending on your climate.

Grown chiefly as an ornamental foliage and erosion-control plant — its small orange-red berries are edible but secondary in size and flavor to the plant's glossy, evergreen, deeply veined leaves and restrained climbing habit.

Hardiness

Zone 8–9

Habit

Shrub

Edible part

Fruit

Ripens

Summer–autumn

Mature size

Scrambling shrub, canes 2–4 m

Light

Partial to full sun

Soil pH

6.0–7.0 (near-neutral)

Environment

Subtropical

Native range

Southeastern China (Guangdong and Guangxi provinces) and Taiwan, across a wide elevation range in forests, thickets, and shrublands with limited competing vegetation

Status

Wild

Years to fruit

2–4 yrs

Growth speed

Reported as fast-growing once established by commercial growers

Spacing

200 cm (79 in) apart — about 4 m² (43 sq ft) per plant

Leaf shape

Evergreen, lobed and conspicuously veined leaves with a textured upper surface

Root system

A perennial crown and shallow spreading root system in the top 30–40 cm, carrying biennial canes: each cane grows one year, fruits the next, then dies. New shoots come from buds on both the crown and the roots, which is why a bramble returns from root fragments left after digging and why it is so hard to remove once settled.

Fruit description

Small orange-red aggregate berries following white flowers; edible but valued less than the foliage

Propagation

Softwood cuttings in early summer, root cuttings in late winter, or seed sown in autumn

Pollination

Self-fertile

The edible parts listed above are a starting point, not a field guide. Identify a plant with certainty — ideally against a local authority — before eating any part of it, and read the full disclaimer. Spotted something wrong? Report it.