Ugh! Sour Blackberries

[Sylvie]

All my blackberries are sour or slightly bitter this year. This includes both the thornless and the wild berries. They were sweet the last couple years and this year they are prolific, just sour. Anyone know if there a soil amendment that corrects this? My soil is slightly acidic clay loam which I thought blackberries preferred. Too late for this year so they are going into jellies.

 

[catjac1975]

Maybe you are picking them too soon. If I pick them black, but the cells are not full they will be sour. Or it could be drought.

 

[Smart Red]

My money is on the drought. I have a pretty good assortment of small fruits growing here. This year, the only successful harvest has been from my currants. All the other fruits were small, dry, and seedy because of the dry conditions we've had.

Love, Linn B (aka Smart Red) Gardening in zone 4b-5a, newly 5b? -- anyway, Im still in the same spot in south-est, central-est Wisconsin

 

[Sylvie]

My berries got some well placed showers and are large, fully formed and juicy. While we have the drought here, that usually results in dried up berries. Northern Ohio.

 

[Chickie'sMomaInNH]

same up here. there are tons of berries on the canes but when i tasted them a couple days ago they were bitter.

 

[digitS']

Hi Sylvie

I was recently reading about "brix gardening" . . . Brix is the usual measure for determining how much sugar is in fruits & veggies. I was left with the idea that there isn't a whole lot that has been shown other than balanced fertilization that can add to sweetness & flavor. Of course, weather is a factor.

There was some research as to whether commercial humic acid products would change brix levels. It didn't look to me that they did.

Pumping the plants up with nitrogen seemed to be a bad idea and just trying for high production and appearance . . . well, we all know that the "industry" hasn't paid much attention to flavor in just about forever.

It just seemed to come down to providing a broad range of nutrients to the plants without excesses but that just might be my reading of things.

Steve