All that sowing, mulching, watering and reaping to grow your own may not be as much of a chore as you suppose, and fruit and veg simply tastes better if you eat it fresh from the ground. It's all to do with the sugars: the natural sugars in a strawberry or tomato, for example, will start turning to starch within minutes of it being cut from the plant, a process that will rob the fruits of much of their beautiful sweet flavour.
Can anyone grow their own fruit? The answer is yes. Even someone with a window box or small balcony can cultivate a fruits.

Soft fruits
Things to consider:
• Each strawberry plant should give you about 1kg of fruit.
• Each Raspberry cane, when established, should give you about 500g of fruit.
• Strawberry varieties are of two types: June bearers and Everbearers. The June bearers will fruit, strangely enough, in June but some
varieties are late fruiting and will extend the season through intoAugust/September, depending upon where you live. Everbearers
produce fruit from June/July through to frost but the plants are usually only grown for one year.
• Varieties of June bearers are numerous, some examples to give continuity, would be Honeoye, Emily, Rosie or Mae as early varieties to choose from followed by a maincrop variety like Elsanta, Pegasus or Alice and a later variety Symphony, Florence or Rhapsody.
• Varieties of Everbearers are less common but names to look out for are Flamenco, Diamante, Everest and Aromel.
• Raspberries similarly come in 2 types; those which fruit on the cane produced the previous year and those which fruit late in the year on cane produced the same year(Primo cane).
• Within the first group are varieties like Glen Ample, Glen Moy, Tulameen and Glen Magna. The primo cane group include Autumn Bliss and Allgold, a very attractive and tasty yellow raspberry.

Soil preparation
Regardless of whether you are growing one or the other or both fruits the soil preparation should be very thorough. Preferably double dig the area.
Check the pH of the soil and correct with lime if necessary. If the soil is very acid then apply half the lime in the autumn and dig it in followed by the
remainder in the Spring before planting.
Raspberries will appreciate a generous amount of organic matter at their roots whereas strawberries will produce leaves and very little fruit if given lush
growing conditions.
Strawberries are most easily grown on a raised bed which is covered with a black plastic mulch to prevent weed growth and keep the fruit clean and
disease free. Two rows spaced 30-40cm apart with an in-row spacing of 30cm on each bed will allow easy access for picking.
Raspberries should be planted on a ridge if the soil is at all poorly drained at a spacing of 50cm apart in the row and about 1.5 to 2m apart between the rows.
Make sure the roots of the plants don't dry out before planting or during establishment.
Strawberries require very little fertiliser after an initial balanced base dressing and thereafter use potassium sulphate (sulphate of potash) at about 15-
20g/m2 each spring. Don't attempt to keep strawberries going for years and years, the fruit quality will deteriorate as will the vigour of the plant.
Raspberries require more fertiliser to grow new cane and produce fruit. A general fertiliser, like Growmore (7:7:7) should be applied before planting at
about 60-70g/m2 and probably a "Rose fertiliser", which contains more potassium, in subsequent years.

Pests and Diseases
As with all crops there is a complete range of insects and diseases which attack at regular, and almost predictable, intervals:
• Aphids, (Greenfly), most damaging in the spring on new growth.
• Vine Weevil ... watch out for serrated leaves and treat with a biological control during the early autumn.
• Botrytis, (Grey mould), caused by fruit being in contact with the soil or damp conditions.
• Mildew can attack raspberries as well as strawberries, usually caused by the plant being under stress and therefore more
susceptible.

Other fruits to consider growing:
Black, white and red currants, gooseberries, brambles and the hybrids between raspberry and bramble, blueberry and our own native blaeberry,
lingonberry, and cranberry amongst others, of which there are many.


Apples and pears
There are two main groups of apple and pear varieties: 'tip bearing', where fruit is mainly borne on the end of shoots, and 'spur bearing', where the fruit is carried on short spurs' close to the main stem or branch. When training fruit in a restricted way as described below tip bearers should be avoided.
Varieties which are tip bearers include 'Beauty of Bath', 'Laxtons Superb' and 'Worcester Pearmain'. Other fruit, plums, cherries, peaches etc aren't such a problem in this respect.
Until recently these stone fruits have been the province of the largest gardens - not only on account of their size but also because of the need to grow two or three varieties to ensure cross-pollination. Modern dwarfing rootstocks, as well as the introduction of improved varieties have changed all this. 'Stella' is an excellent self-fertile variety for fan trained cherries; 'Victoria' takes a lot of beating for plums and 'Peregrine' is a good first choice for a peach on a warm, south-facing wall.

Cordons (for apples, pears and plums)
This is the most common form of restricting the growth of fruit trees. Trees are planted about 1m (3ft) apart and are trained at an angle of 45% onto supporting wires, fence or wall.
The tree is grown as a single stem by cutting back all side shoots to encourage fruiting buds. The height to which the tree is grown depends on your reach, although cordons are rarely grown above 2 m (6 ft). Vertical cordons are a less usual form in which the tree is trained vertically, rather than at an angle. Prune cordons by cutting back all side shoots in late summer: disregard the small tuft of leaves at base of side shoot, count three leaves along and cut close to the third leaf - never through it. If secondary growth springs from these cuts, prune these back in the autumn to one leaf from their basal tuft.

Espaliers (for apples and pears)
This is a larger version of the cordon, where the main stem is grown vertically, and side shoots are trained horizontally in tiers. Trees are planted 4-5 m (about 12-15 ft) apart. Side branches are trained in opposite pairs, spaced at approximately 35 cm (15 in) intervals, and the number of tiers grown will depend on your reach. Prune all shoots from side branches in the same way as described for cutting side-shoots from cordons.
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