The Boysenberry

Dominion, Volume 37, Issue 121, 17 February 1944, Page 4

The Boysenberry

Sir,—ln "The Dominion”"of February 10. it is reported that the Waikato subprovincial executive of the Farmers’ Union has asked the Department of Agriculture to declare the Boysenberry a noxious weed. The following informa; tion may be reassuring to the Farmers’ Union regarding the dangerous potentialities of the Boysenberry, plantations of which I have had under observation for a period of over seven years.. The breedin- of the Boysenberry is obscure, being first discovered growing, on a farm in California, and was introduced into cultivation bv-Rudolph Boysen, superintendent of parks, Andheim, California. The statement that it produces adventitious underground shoots in the same way ns the blackberries and raspberries is not correct. The Loganberry and the Boysenberry are classified as dewberries, plants which are confined to producing all new vines from the crown of the plant. The tips of growing vines will root if undisturbed, and it may be spread by seed eaten by birds. In line with many plants, a new shoot will arise from roots which have been cut by cultivation: a seven-year plantation of an acre of Boysenberry in the Masterton area shows no evidence to date of plants coming from the roots except where the plough or spade has cut the roots. Adjoining this plantation is an area of approximately two acres of native bush. I have carefully searched this bush for evidence of birds distributing seed, but so far have been unable to find seedlings. It would appear arbitrary, and one may say frivolous, to prohibit the growing of this valuable fruit under cultivated conditions while hundreds of acres of blackberry-infested country is subject to so little control. —I am, etc., M. DAVEY. Masterton February 14.