Plant your own currants!

Red currant sprigs hanging from branches.

Tasty and vitamin-rich, currant is the chance to cook up delicious jelly.

Plant some in your garden!

How to choose your currant bush

Before purchasing your currant bushes, there are several criteria to consider. First of all, the color of the fruits: they can be red, white or pink.

Secondly, the harvest date, which can range from end of June to August depending on the variety and the area you live in.

In any case, try to pick hardy varieties so that you can avoid having to treat them, and generally to make life easier.

Hardy and productive cultivars

‘Palluau fertile’ is a vigorous and productive shrub that produces nice bunches of bright red fruits, tart and tangy and particularly full of flavor.

‘Junifer’ also produces very tasty red berries at the beginning of July.

‘Versailles’, both white and red, is a heirloom variety that is quite vigorous and productive. Towards mid-July, it produces mild tasting fruits for the white variety; and juicy fruits perfect for making jam for the red variety.

‘Rolland’ is a variety that is well-known for its invulnerability to diseases. It produces red berries from mid-July onwards.

Planting and care

Close-up of red currant berriesTransplant your currant plants from November to February (or in spring) in a cool and humus-rich soil (avoid chalk soil). Part-shade is best. Plant each stem, with the collar at ground level. Backfill – with compost – and water abundantly. Mulch and regularly water your plants in summer, especially if it is a hot and dry summer.

Once your shrub has settled in, all you have left to do every year is to remove those stems that are three years of age. Try to clear the center of the plant, so that light can reach inside. You can act preventively to reinforce your currant’s immune system, and spray fermented weed extracts such as nettle or horsetail. If powdery mildew appears, immediately remove infected branches.

M.-C. H.