Nicole's Quick Take: The easiest way to grow blackberries in your backyard is on a blackberry trellis, like an arch (I recommend the Nicole Arch Trellis or the Manhattan Trellis), that gives the canes room to climb, plenty of sun, and lots of airflow. Choose a thornless, semi-erect variety, plant just one on each side of the arch, and you can be picking fresh, chemical-free berries all summer long.

Why I Grow My Blackberries on an Arch

The first year I grew blackberries, I had no idea how wild and big these plants could get. I planted them right in the ground and ended up with a huge, tangled, pest-infested mess.

After that year, I started growing them on an arch trellis instead, and it changed everything. An arch lets blackberry canes grow big and wide, gives them tons of sunlight and airflow, and creates a beautiful entrance into your garden. Here's my five-step method.

Step 1: Set Up Your Blackberry Trellis

Before you buy a single plant, set up your trellis. Blackberries are perennials, so this structure will be holding heavy canes and fruit for years to come. A good blackberry trellis keeps the canes up off the ground, makes picking so much easier, and turns your berry patch into a beautiful entrance to your garden. Here's what to look for.

WHAT TO LOOK FOR IN A BLACKBERRY TRELLIS:

• Set it deep: Sink the legs at least 1 foot into the ground. This trellis should never move.
• Go tall: Make it at least 6 feet tall. Mine is about 7 feet from the ground.
• Go wide: Make it wide enough to fit a wheelbarrow through. I like room for two people to walk through side by side.

One budget option is a cattle panel bent into an arch. Or you can choose a kit that ships to your door, like the Nicole Arch Trellis or the Manhattan Trellis. Both slide together without any complicated tools.

Step 2: Choose the Right Blackberry Variety

Once your trellis is in place, it's time to pick out your plants. Blackberries come in thorny and thornless types, and their canes grow in different ways: some trail along the ground, some stand stiffly upright, and some fall in between. For an arch, the variety you choose makes a big difference in how easy your plants are to train and harvest. Look for two things on the plant tag.

• Thornless: This makes the plants so much more pleasant to grow and pick, and it matters for how you'll train them.
• Semi-erect: These canes are pliable and bendable, which is important because you'll be weaving them in and out of the trellis as they grow.

My favorite variety is Triple Crown. Chester is another great thornless, semi-erect option.

Step 3: Plant Two Blackberries Per Arch

Here's the good news: you don't need many plants to get a big harvest. Because blackberries are perennials that spread and fill in over time, a couple of plants will give you berries for years. You only need two blackberry plants per arch trellis, one on each side. More than one per side just crowds them.

You don't need to amend the soil much, but I like to add a little organic compost to each planting hole. If your canes are floppy at first, tie them loosely to the arch with a bit of twine to start training them up.

Step 4: Know Your Canes (Primocanes vs. Floricanes)

Understanding how blackberry canes grow is the key to pruning them the right way and getting the biggest harvest. This is the part I didn't know, and it ruined my harvest that first year. Blackberry canes grow in stages, and each cane only fruits once.

HOW BLACKBERRY CANES GROW:

• Year one, the primocane: The cane grows tall and leafy, and nothing else seems to happen. Don't cut it back. Its job is to grow strong roots and get ready for next year. Just train it through your trellis and let it be.
• Year two, the floricane: This is when the magic happens. The same cane flowers and then fruits, giving you the sweetest blackberries you've ever tasted.
• After fruiting: Once a floricane has finished fruiting, it won't produce again. Cut it all the way down to the ground to make room for new canes.

At any given time, your plant will have canes at different stages, so it's worth learning to tell them apart.

What helps: A sharp pair of bypass pruners makes cutting back old canes quick and clean. I use the pruners from my Gardenary Copper Plated Garden Tool Set. Here are the other best gardening tools I recommend.

Step 5: Harvest Every Day (and Tip Your Canes)

This is the best part. Once your second-year canes start to flower, the harvest is only weeks away. You'll first see clusters of white or light purple flowers. Over several weeks, the petals fall away and tiny green berries form, then slowly turn red, and finally black. A few simple habits during this stage will give you the most berries.

• Wait for black: A berry picked halfway through ripening is a little tart. Pick it when it's completely black.
• Feed the soil: When berries start turning red, add a little compost around the base of the plant. Feed the soil, not the plant.
• Pick, pick, pick: Once berries ripen, harvest every day. Berries left on the cane invite wildlife and slow down production. If you travel in midsummer, send a neighbor over to pick.
• Tip the canes: Around midsummer, snip the tip of each long cane. This tells the plant to put its energy into finishing the fruit and, early in the season, into side shoots that bring more berries.

My Favorite Blackberry Trellises: The Nicole Arch and the Manhattan Arch

If you'd rather skip the cattle panel and go straight to something beautiful that lasts, these are the two arch trellises I recommend for blackberries. Both are made from sturdy steel, slide together without power tools, and include a free Gardenary Guide to Growing Vertically ebook.

Grow Blackberries as a Living Fence

Blackberries are native to the United States, which makes them a great addition to a native plant living fence. I planted mine as part of a living fence that gives me flowers and fruit and helps protect my garden from deer. Here's how to keep deer out of your garden naturally, and here's how to turn any fence into a living wall of raspberries and blackberries.

Watch: How to Grow Blackberries in Your Backyard

In this video, I walk you through all five steps, from setting up the arch to picking the first ripe berries.