Cooperative Extension Service | Agriculture and Natural Resources | Family and Consumer Sciences | 4-H Youth Development | Community and Economic Development

University of KentuckyCollege of Agriculture,Food and EnvironmentCooperative Extension ServiceID-255

BerryCare: Building a Blackberry Community Dawn Brewer, PhD, RD and Annie Koempel, MA, RD, Dietetics and Human Nutrition, and Amy Kostelic, PhD, Family Sciences

You’ve likely heard how blackberries are good for your health. Growing blackberry bushes

as a garden project can even be rewarding for your mental health if you do it as a group. Your local Cooperative Extension Office or non-profit organization may have the perfect place and peo-ple for planting the bushes where berries can be shared with an identified community. With the right group, a little sunshine and good drainage, the right variety, and proper blackberry plant care, a group can work towards a successful harvest. (For more information on how to plant blackberry bushes, please review the publica-tions Growing Blackberries and Raspberries in Kentucky [HO-15] from UK CES and Blackber-ries [CCD-CP-4] from the UK Center for Crop Diversification).

There are a lot of factors to consider when beginning a blackberry gardening project. A com-mittee can help decide where should the garden be located? Would a certain variety of blackberry do better than another? When is the proper time to harvest? How should the berries be stored?

What is the best way to incorporate these berries into the diet once harvested? These issues are all important, and oftentimes it is easiest to make decisions when a group of informed and inter-ested individuals come together to make these decisions at the beginning of a project.

Developing a committee early in the process is key to the success of growing blackberry bushes or any type of community garden.

Ideally, committee members are motivated volunteers who are willing to give a little more of

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their time to the project to ensure its success for the entire community. A committee could include three to eight dedicated individuals.

Committees can work in a variety of ways; some people might want to take charge of one as-pect of a project while others might prefer moving between activities and roles. However your com-mittee chooses to operate, Table 1 lists a few tasks crucial to maintaining blackberry bushes.

Community partners can also play an impor-tant role in your blackberry gardening project. Reach out to local schools, clubs, senior centers,

Table 1. Tasks to maintain blackberry bushes.Ordering blackberry plants and finding a location to store them until the plant datePreparing the soilWateringWeedingFertilizingPest managementPruningHarvesting berriesSharing and storing berries

fitness centers, community centers, and other or-ganizations that might be interested in partnering with you. Sharing the responsibility to care for the plants can be helpful and fun. This can also help to build neighborhood ties and facilitate the development of relationships in your area. Strong communities are often built on shared stories, exchanges of information, expressions of creativ-ity, and projects that prepare the community for the future. Members of strong communities tend to inspire others to make their physical and social environment a better place and to support each other more. Having a strong sense of community or belonging also leads to stronger families and a healthier community.

Throughout the course of the BerryCare lesson series, you will learn a lot of information to help you answer questions specific to blackberry plants and gardening. A lot of the skills you will learn can also be used to grow other plants, such as raspberries and blueberries. Having a strong sense of community—and a core group of dedicated committee members—will assure the continued growth of your plants and your community.

Educational programs of Kentucky Cooperative Extension serve all people regardless of economic or social status and will not discriminate on the basis of race, color, ethnic ori-gin, national origin, creed, religion, political belief, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, pregnancy, marital status, genetic information, age, veteran status, or physical or mental disability. Issued in furtherance of Cooperative Extension work, Acts of May 8 and June 30, 1914, in cooperation with the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Nancy M. Cox, Director, Land Grant Programs, University of Kentucky College of Agriculture, Food and Environment, Lexington, and Kentucky State University, Frankfort. Copyright © 2018 for materials developed by University of Kentucky Cooperative Extension. This publication may be reproduced in portions or its entirety for educational or nonprofit pur-poses only. Permitted users shall give credit to the author(s) and include this copyright notice. Publications are also available on the World Wide Web at www.ca.uky.edu.Issued 7-2019 Zurijeta/Getty Images Plus, Getty Images

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AcknowledgementThis publication is made possible in part by

the 2016 UK HES Extension Activity Award and grant number P42 ES007380 from the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, NIH. Its contents are solely the responsibility of the au-thors and do not necessarily represent the official views of NIEHS, NIH.

ReferencesCDC. (2014). About healthy places. Retrieved

January 18, 2017, at: https://www.cdc.gov/healthyplaces/about.htm.

McMillan, D. (2014). 4 Elements to Creating a “Sense of Community” by Dr. David McMil-lan. Retrieved January 18, 2017, at: http://thecommunitymanager.com/2014/02/06/4-elements-to-creating-a-sense-of-community-by-dr-david-mcmillan.

New Hampshire Extension. (n.d.). Community Building: Strengthening Sense of Commu-nity. Retrieved January 17, 2017, at: https://extension.unh.edu/resources/files/Re-source000625_Rep647.pdf.

New Hampshire Extension. (n.d.). Community Building: Strengthening Sense of Community Best Practices. Retrieved January 17, 2017, at: https://extension.unh.edu/resources/files/Re-source000626_Rep648.pdf.