Crops & Breeds › Soft Fruit Plants
🫐 Elderberry
Soft Fruit Plants · growing reference
| To first harvest | ~2 years – ~3 years, by type |
|---|---|
| Spacing | 72″ in the row × 144″ between rows |
| Planted as | plant |
| Water | ~1–1.5 in a week |
When to plant
In USDA zone 6, for example: Plant around Mar 4, while the stock is still dormant — bare-root wants to be in the ground before it leafs out.
| Spring | |
|---|---|
| Zone 3 | Apr 3 |
| Zone 4 | Mar 26 |
| Zone 5 | Mar 15 |
| Zone 6 | Mar 4 |
| Zone 7 | Feb 18 |
| Zone 8 | Feb 1 |
| Zone 9 | Jan 9 |
Dates are the typical window for each zone's average frost dates — your own last frost can differ by a couple of weeks. Zone 10 and warmer is effectively frost-free: plant to the season, not the frost. Southern Hemisphere: shift six months.
Elderberry Types
- American · ~2 years · 10–20 lbs/plant — S. canadensis — zone 3–9 native, Adams and York; the US homestead standard.
- European · ~3 years · 8–15 lbs/plant — S. nigra — Haschberg, Samdal: bigger, later, heavier fruit; the European commercial kind.
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