Use pruned raspberry canes to create attractive woven garden edging. This easy project is great for the vegetable garden or for decorative borders. Full DIY video at the end.
Every gardener who grows raspberries goes through the same winter ritual: taking out the old wood. Whether you have autumn or summer fruiting varieties you’ll be left with a bundle of canes that generally gets burned or composted. It seems like such a waste, especially when you consider the other materials that we spend money on to bring into the garden. This winter I kept the canes until I came up with a good idea for how to use them. They lay in a stack for about a month before an idea struck me — they could be used to make raspberry cane garden edging.
There’s a video at the bottom explaining the simple weaving process in a visual way. The end product can last several years and at the end of that time, simply replace the old garden edging with newly pruned raspberry canes. It’s a project that doesn’t take long, either.
Materials needed for this project
- A bundle of pruned raspberry canes
- Bamboo cut into 18″ segments
- Secateurs or a hacksaw
- Hammer
Weave the raspberry canes around the uprights
Discarded raspberry canes
There are only two materials that I used to create my woven ‘Wattle’ edging that you see in this project: a bundle of raspberry canes, and three old bamboo canes. I also use the support from larger wooden stakes that I have driven into the ground but these are optional. I’ve made this same raspberry cane garden edging in another area and the bamboo segments are enough to hold it in place.
Raspberry canes grow every year and normally gardeners cut them down in the winter and get rid of them. Using them for something attractive and functional in the garden is a far more clever idea. Since my garden is on a slope, they help to keep the compost from eroding out of my raspberry bed.
After you prune raspberry canes, set them aside to use for this project
Pruning Raspberry Canes
The first step is to prune your raspberries. Autumn fruiting varieties (like mine) are generally cut down to the ground every year. I cut mine to about two inches from the ground. You prune all the canes because they fruit most productively on new wood. Summer fruiting varieties fruit on canes that grew the previous summer. For those types, you need to selectively prune out the canes that have already fruited.
You prune autumn-fruiting raspberries in winter when the plants are dormant. Summer-fruiting tends to happen mainly at the end of summer. Either way, the canes should still be alive even though they may look withered and dead. Discard any that are soggy, brittle, or look diseased. In the photo below you can see how many canes I needed for the section of edging I made: it was a decent sized bundle.
Use segments of bamboo for the uprights
Bamboo Cane Supports
When you cut raspberry canes they’re at first flexible and strong. Over time they will harden and lose their bendiness and strength so they need solid supports so that they remain in place. Bamboo canes fit the bill. Even when they’re old and beaten up they can still be strong.
The supports for the wattle edging are 18″ segments of bamboo cane that I cut with a hacksaw. Pressed 4 inches into the ground at 12-18″ apart they’ll be your edging’s support. I recommend that you run a piece of string along the area you want to build the edging. Use it as a guide to place your bamboo supports in a straight line.
I’d recommend keeping raspberry cane garden edging less than 18″ tall
Creating Raspberry Cane Garden Edging
Once the bamboo canes are in, begin weaving in the raspberry canes. Begin from one end and weave one cane in and around the pegs and push it all the way to the ground. Take a second cane and weave it along the same pegs but in the opposite direction — the video at the top of this post shows the process.
Once you have two canes woven in you move to the next section and weave canes in exactly the same manner in that space. All you’re doing is winding the canes in and out of the bamboo pegs and then making sure the cane that follows it is woven in the opposite way around. Simple.
The finished product will last for several years but could be topped up annually
Finishing the Raspberry Cane Edging
Once you’ve built up the edging to the desired height all you need to do is hammer in the bamboo pegs. More for aesthetic reasons than anything, you bang them in so that the tops are flush with each other and are just above the top of the raspberry canes. I used the back of my hatchet to do this in the video but most would probably use a hammer. The finished product is strong, attractive, and pretty much free! It’s such a good feeling to transform ‘waste’ into useful things.
Absolutely love this video and I have just started making a woven edging for the first bed in our allotment today using cut raspberry canes. Your video was really informative and easy to follow. Thank you!!
Brilliant, and so pleased to hear it!
I assume that there are no sharp needles/prickers on your vines? All my raspberries and blackberries have painful prickers. I would have to remove them first before I wove them, I guess.
Some of my canes do have tiny thorns, as yours do. I think leaving the canes out in the weather helps break some of them down but I wear garden gloves when weaving too.
Great blog.
I just started out as a new Allotmenteer in June 2018.
here is my Youtube Channel documenting my progress from day 1 if you are interested. I wish you all the best of luck on your allotment journey. All my Organic Love from Nathan at Allotment 5W.
hello, i am new here, and i love your blog and info. i was looking for a book on all these garden projects cos i find looking at the screen tiring. you do not know a good book about using twigs and branches and other objects, i cannot find any apart from jim long. thanks for so much info. xxx
Loving your blog. After a three-year wait, I’ve just inherited a large plot awash with raspberry canes and tangled strawberry beds. Will be taking your advice and heading up there with a few bags of manure and black plastic sheeting. Can’t wait to have a go at making this edging – thank you 🙂
Good luck with your new plot Lisa! It sounds like you’ll have plenty of material to make raspberry cane garden edging 🙂
Great idea, I moved into a house which had two raspberry bushes which had not been looked after for over 5 years. I am committed to re-using material and for example, I grew nasturium and mint in lawn grass cuttings. For this, I used old fish crates which I found in the garden but you have given me an idea to create a mini raised bed made from raspberry canes.
It works with grapevine, too. I weave the trimmed vines through my wire farm fence. It’s beautiful, and it’s a very meditative activity as well.
I never thought to do this with light materials. I made a fence at the front of my woods using downed and trimmed branches in much the same way. Great idea!
What a brilliant idea. I might even give it a go using some new raspberry canes as the uprights, then it will be a living edging.
The only issue with trying this is keeping them all in a straight line. If you could manage that then you just prune them when they’re finished fruiting!
Great idea to use just what you happen to have around! I tried the same with Eucalyptus branches when I lived in Portugal. That became a far more coarse edge/fence though since it’s less flexible. Still, I got rid of material that else would have just ended up on the compost heap.
Exactly! Think of how we bring so many materials into our garden when we have things at hand that we can use. Even if your Eucalyptus fence was coarse, you reduced garden waste and saved money. Well done!
This is beautiful! What a great way for reuse in the garden. I’ve seen this done with willow, but not raspberry!
Thanks Melissa! Me too regarding seeing it with willow before — but ‘why not use what you have?’ is what I was thinking 😀