RASPBERRIES 



BLACK RASPBERRIES 



269 



North America, but some promising forms 

 now grow wild in temperate Asia, and several 

 brambles furnish wild food in temperate South 

 America. Even the tropics in the northern 

 hemisphere are enriched by a few species of 

 edible brambles, none of which, however, is 

 cultivated. Rubus belongs to the order of 

 Rosaceae and is closely related to the genus 

 Rosa, from which it differs chiefly in the 

 structure of the flower and fruit. 



Plants evergreen or deciduous ; shrubby, climbing, or 

 running ; thorny, prickly or rarely unarmed ; variously 

 pubescent or glabrous, sometimes glandular ; tips of 

 canes usually recurving. Leaves alternate, petiolate, 

 stipulate ; simple or compound, usually palmately lobed 

 or palmately compound ; stipules free or jointed to the 

 base of the petiole. Flowers sometimes solitary but 

 usually many-flowered in corymbs or racemes ; white, 

 pink, rose-colored or red ; calyx composed of a little 

 cup with 5 persistent sepals crowning it ; petals 5, 

 conspicuous, deciduous ; stamens numerous, inserted on 

 the margin of the cup ; pistils many, inserted on the 

 rising bottom of the cup, becoming juicy drupelets in 

 all of the cultivated species. 



The genus naturally divides into several 

 subgenera, of which the pomologist is inter- 

 ested in but two. Idaeobatus, the raspberries; 

 and Eubatus, the blackberries and dewberries. 



Idteobatus. Red, purple, black, white or yellow 

 raspberries, the fruit composed of coherent drupelets and 

 coming loose from a moist torus ; the cultivated species, 

 erect or ascendent shrubs ; flowers mostly in short 

 clusters. 



Eubatus. Very dark red, black, or rarely white, 

 blackberries and dewberries, the drupelets adhering to 

 the torus ; cultivated species erect, trailing or climbing ; 

 flowers panniculate or racemose. 



RASPBERRIES 



1. R. idceus, Linn. European Raspberry. Canes 

 stiff and upright, light colored, glandular when young, 

 beset with nearly straight, slender prickles. Leaves 

 compound with 3-5 leaflets which are oblong-ovate, 

 pointed, irregularly serrate, downy-white underneath, 

 lateral ones sessile, usually more or less wrinkled. 

 Flowers small, white, borne in long interrupted clusters ; 

 peduncles dividing into 2 or 3 pedicels ; the flowering 

 shoots as well as the petioles and midribs finely pubes- 

 cent and sparingly furnished with firm, recurved 

 prickles ; calyx velvety, sometimes with a few prickles ; 

 petals as long as the sepals. Fruit oblong or conical, 

 light or dark red, white or yellow, borne more or less 

 continuously throughout the season. 



The European raspberry is a native of Eu- 

 rope from Greece and Italy, north into Scan- 

 dinavia and far eastward into Asia. It was 

 named for Mount Ida, in Asia Minor, and was 

 possibly more or less cultivated in southern 

 Europe in ancient times, although a cursory 

 search does not reveal statements to that 

 effect. In England, Turner, the herbalist, in 

 1538, says it grows in English gardens, and in 

 1629, Parkinson, another herbalist, mentions 

 both white and red varieties. 



This species furnishes the "European varieties 

 of the cultivated raspberries, black and purple 

 raspberries being scarcely known in the Old 

 World. It was early brought to America by 

 colonists from Europe, and prior to the middle 

 of the nineteenth century was the only rasp- 

 berry commonly cultivated in this country, as 

 many as sixty-seven varieties being described 

 in 1867. Pure-bred European raspberries are 

 now practically driven from cultivation by 



the hardier, healthier, and more productive 

 American species. No doubt there are some 

 hybrids with American raspberries. The species 

 is occasionally found wild in northeastern 

 United States as an escape from cultivation. 

 Antwerp, Fastolf, Franconia, Orange, and Ver- 

 mont are typical varieties still found in an 

 occasional garden in the United States. The 

 species is propagated from suckers. 



2. R. strigosus, Michx. American Red Raspberry. 

 This species is much like the last, and many botanists 

 combine the two. They are separated, however, by sev- 

 eral marked differences. Thus, the habit of growth of 

 the American species is more open ; the canes are more 

 slender, are darker in color, more glaucous, and the 

 prickles are stiffer ; the leaves are thinner ; the flowering 

 shoots, petioles and calyx are beset with gland-tipped 

 hairs and bristles ; the calyx is less pubescent ; the 

 flower-clusters are more open ; the fruit is a lighter red, 

 white- and yellow-fruited forms are much rarer ; and 

 the tendency to fruit continuously is lacking. 



The species is common in northern United 

 States and southern Canada, westward to the 

 Rocky Mountains, and on the Pacific coast 

 northward to Alaska. It is found also in 

 Asia. The red species is hardier and ranges 

 farther north than the black raspberry, with 

 which it is often associated in northern United 

 States. Cuthbert, Marlboro, June, and Loudon 

 are typical varieties. Propagation is by suckers. 



Named varieties of the American red rasp- 

 berry were not introduced until about 1860, 

 although it now appears that at least two and 

 possibly three varieties of this species had 

 been passing for some years previous as off- 

 spring of R. idceus. The culture of this fruit, 

 however, received its first impetus with the 

 introduction of the Cuthbert in 1865. Po- 

 mological literature contains records of no 

 less than 150 varieties that have been intro- 

 duced since 1860, although probably not more 

 than forty or fifty kinds are now offered by 

 nurserymen. 



Students of this variable genus have sepa- 

 rated two or three other species and at least 

 two botanical varieties from R. strigosus, of 

 which but one other form, yar. albus, Fuller, 

 is of importance to pomologists. This variety 

 bears amber-white fruits, and to it have been 

 referred some of the white-fruited varieties 

 under cultivation. 



3. R. occidentalis, Linn. Black Raspberry. Black- 

 cap. Thimbleberry. Canes strong, erect, glaucous, not 

 bristly, beset with hooked spines ; recurving and rooting 

 at the tips. Leaves compound with 3 or rarely 5 leaflets 

 which are ovate, pointed, sharply serrate and notched, 

 white beneath ; petioles armed with prickles ; lateral 

 leaflets usually stalked. Flowers borne in small, dense, 

 prickly clusters ; petals shorter than the sepals. Fruit 

 black or sometimes amber-white, rather small, hemi- 

 spherical, firm ; ripens later than the red raspberry. 



The black raspberry ranges south from New 

 Brunswick and southern Quebec to Georgia 

 and Missouri, and westward to Oregon, Wash- 

 ington, and British Columbia. A botanical 

 form, yar. pallidus, Bailey, with yellow-amber 

 fruit, is sometimes found growing wild. This 

 species is usually to be found in fence-rows, 

 in copses, and along roadsides, a common and 

 useful food-plant, although sometimes a pestif- 

 erous weed in vast regions throughout the 



