I'm familiar with currants and gooseberries by name alone since my New England relatives grew the bushes in their gardens.  I'd barely tasted the fruits and wasn't all that excited until I read that currants were a favorite of Robert Hart's since they will produce fruit even in the shade.  As usual, Uncommon Fruits Worthy of Attention had answers to all of my top questions.

What's the difference between a currant and a gooseberry?  Gooseberries and black, white, and red currants are all in the Ribes genus.  Gooseberries are a hybrid of R. uva-crispa and R. hirtellum, and they counteract their big thorns with large, sweet berries.  Currants are thornless, but have smaller fruits that are quite tart and are less often eaten uncooked.  They come in two categories --- black currants are a mixture of R. nigrum, R. odoratum, and R. americanum and red and white currants are both a mixture of R. rubrum, R. sativum, and R. petraeum.  Both kinds of currants are unrelated to the raisin-like "currants", which are actually a dried grape like any other raisin.

Where can I grow currants and gooseberries?  Currants and gooseberries are great for northern climates (some are even hardy in zone 2), and some can be grown further south.  In all cases, if you're planting them toward the southern end of their range (below zone 5), you should give them some shade, perhaps plant them on the north side of a hill, and mulch them heavily to keep moisture around their roots.  Gooseberries are often listed as growing all the way to zone 8, while currants are often listed only down to zone 5 or 6.

How do I grow and prune them?  Plant currant and gooseberry bushes four to six feet apart in heavy soil with plenty of organic matter.  Each year, thin out the new shoots so that only two or three stems for red currants or six stems for gooseberries remain from that year, leaving older stems in place.  After three years for currants or four years for gooseberries, begin to remove the oldest set of stems as well during the winter pruning.  The result is a mixture of stems of different ages ranging from one to three years for currants and from one to four years for gooseberries.  Pruning for black currants is a bit different since these bushes bear primarily on one year old wood --- cut out two to five of the oldest branches each year and shorten other branches.

How do I propagate gooseberries and currants?  All can be grown from seed as long as you don't mind them not breeding true; the seeds require three to four months of stratification, and will bear at two to three years.  To maintain your varieties, use one of the several methods of cloning instead.  Twelve inch long hardwood cuttings (excluding the tip) should be taken in the early fall before all the leaves have dropped for gooseberries, or in early spring, autumn, or the end of summer for currants.  An even easier way to propagate gooseberries or black currants is tip layering --- bending down a branch and covering it with soil and a rock, then cutting the new plant free once roots have formed.

What about the white pine blister rust?  The reason that gooseberries and currants are seldom grown in the United States is that they were illegal for decades.  In the early twentieth century, the white pine blister rust showed up in America and began wiping out what was then an important timber tree.  Since some Ribes species were an alternate host for the rust, planting gooseberries or currants was prohibited by federal law, and Civilian Conservation Corps crews began to rip the plants out of gardens and woodlands.  Later, scientists discovered that most cultivated Ribes are resistant to white pine blister rust and don't spread the disease, and the federal ban was finally lifted in 1966.  However, you may still face state restrictions against planting gooseberries and currants, especially against black currants which are most susceptible to the white pine blister rust.

Why are gooseberries and currants permaculture favorites?  Permaculture advocates filling every available niche with a useful plant so that weeds don't have a spot to gain a foothold.  Since gooseberries and currants can fruit in partial shade, they can be used to turn orchards from trees-amid-lawn to a multi-storied forest garden.

Are you growing them?  We ordered two gooseberries (Poorman and Invicta) that will be arriving this month.  We chose gooseberries over currants since I am first and foremost a fresh fruit fanatic.

This post is part of our Uncommon Fruits Worthy of Attention lunchtime series.  Read all of the entries: Uncommon Fruits Worthy of Attention Hardy kiwi: Actinidia arguta Nanking cherry: Prunus tomentosa Gooseberries and currants: Ribes sp. Mulberries: Morus sp.

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About us: Anna Hess and Mark Hamilton spent over a decade living self-sufficiently in the mountains of Virginia before moving north to start over from scratch in the foothills of Ohio. They've experimented with permaculture, no-till gardening, trailersteading, home-based microbusinesses and much more, writing about their adventures in both blogs and books.



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