Transplanting a Native Trailing Blackberry

Today, a small Trailing Blackberry was the only native plant growing in a place where I wanted to put a new compost heap, so I decided to move it to another location. It’s a little early to start transplanting since we are still in the transitional period between the dry season and the wet season. The several inches of rain we’ve gotten in the last month have only soaked the duff and the very top layer of soil. Dig down further than an inch or so and it’s still bone dry. If this year proves typical, it will be late November when enough rain will have fallen to saturate the ground and improve conditions for planting and transplanting. In this case, however, I was able to dig up the small native blackberry with its roots intact and a good gallon of soil still around them in one piece. I found a protected spot for the plant, and I’m confident it will do fine. (See the photo above.)

Trailing Blackberry, like its invasive relative the Himalayan Blackberry, grows well in Puget Sound forests. Their habits and life cycles are much the same and small Himalayans can be mistaken for Trailing Blackberry.

Trailing Blackberry is easy to transplant, even bare-rooted. In fact, it can grow so well that I’ve seen it become a nuisance. I made the mistake of adding a few Trailing Blackberry plants to one native plant bed with especially rich soil and good sun. Within a couple years they overwhelmed the Sword Fern, Lady Fern, Fringe Cup, Youth-on-Age, and other natives, so I dug them up and moved them to a spot with poorer soil and more shade. But since I wasn’t able to get all their roots out of the deep soil, they keep coming back and are proving to be as difficult to control as their Himalayan cousins.