My allotment secretary was giving away what looked like bare rooted raspberry bushes today stating they would grow so they could be used as bean poles, though she said it would take approx 6 years before they will be established and producing beanpoles. The allotment have had a grant to buy trees and these grow your own bean poles and they have been planted in an unoccupied plot on the site. My only problem is the secretary knows nothing about them and they are not named. I have heeled them in for now but need to find some info on them ie planting distances and what i need to do with the ie coppice them?
Can anyone shed any light on this for
we grow hazel for bean poles, could it be this?
willow..bamboo?
It doesn't look like willow or bamboo - i'll google hazel
Hazel is mostly used for bean poles. You let them grow for a few years before coppicing them. You will get bean poles from the shoots that then head skywards at a fast rate of knots and also peas sticks. A coppiced hazel will be a very large bush. IIt probably needs something like at least 8 feet each way floor space so to speak, but of course is often used in hedging so can be controlled to the size you want by pruning.
We have an area on our allotment site where we grow Hazel for pea sticks and bean poles; it needs 'coppicing' after about 7 years from planting the young saplings and then the new growth you will get is best thinned to allow only the strongest ones to grow and these will grow rapidly. Bean poles will take about five to six years but if you want to go for pea sticks, (or you can do a mixture of both) take out the growing point on selected stems when about 50cm high.