Blackberry varieties /

Black Diamond blackberry variety

Rating [ 4 ]

Thornless commercial trailing cultivar with big fruit

Rubus subgenus Rubus Watson 'Black Diamond'

Originated from a cross of Kotata x NZ 8610L-163

Variety denomination - 'Black Diamond', tested as NZ 9128R-1

Plants are thornless

Bushes have trailing canes

Fruit weight is 6 g

Berries have a conical shape

Fruiting habit - floricane fruiting (summer-bearing)

Flowering on floricanes starts in the third week of May

Ripening date (regular) - first week of July

Productivity is 4.7 kg per plant

Soluble solids - 10.4%

Acidity - 1.2%

Cold hardiness is moderate

Heat tolerance is low

Current status - modern or widely used

Country of origin - United States

Agawam Amanda Anastasia Wyeberry Apache Arapaho Babycakes Bailey Big Daddy Black Butte Black Diamond Black Gem Black Jack Black Magic Black Pearl Black Satin Blakely Boysenberry Brazos Caddo Chesapeake Chester Thornless Cheyenne Chickasaw Chief Joseph Choctaw Clark Gold Columbia Giant Columbia Star Columbia Sunrise COX's miracle berry Danna Douglass Doyle's Thornless Eclipse Evergreen Thornless Galaxy Hall’s Beauty Heaven Can Wait Hedrick HJ-6 HJ-7 Hull Thornless Illiny Hardy Kelly Kiowa Kotata Loganberry Lucretia Marion Mary Carmen Metolius MM01 Natchez Navaho Nettleton Creamy White Newberry Nightfall Obsidian Onyx Osage Ouachita Ponca Prime-Ark 45 Prime-Ark Freedom Prime-Ark Horizon Prime-Ark Traveler Prime-Jan Prime-Jim Reuben Schultz Shawnee Siskiyou Smoothstem Sweetie Pie Thornfree Triple Crown Twilight Von Waldo Wild Treasure Willamette Thornless Marion

Black Diamond blackberry is a thornless trailing cultivar from United States Department of Agriculture-Agricultural Research Service. It is one of three thornless varieties which are being released simultaneously - Black Diamond, Black Pearl and Nightfall.
Black Diamond is thornless, but primocanes are thorny on the basal 30 to 40 cm, fruiting laterals are medium in length. Harvest season starts in late June, peaks in early July and largerly done by the third week of July. Fruits of Black Diamond blackberry are uniform, conical, very attractive, have excellent firmness. This firmness leads to a high quiality machine-harvesting product and provides the opportunity for a good fresh market product if hand harvested. Also fruits have good flavor but are less aromatic than Marion blackberry. The average fruit weight for a season is about 6 g.
Winter hardiness is not high, about minus 13 C.

Table 1. Yield and berry weight comparison table for Black Diamond and other varieties (planted in 1999)
Cultivar	Berry weight, g	Yield, kg/ha
Cultivar	Berry weight, g	2001	2002	2003
Black Diamond	5.8	23281	15568	19001
Nightfall	6.2	42447	13405	20962
Silvan	6.2	31757	16811	21486
Marion	5.1	26380	13021	18397
Black Pearl	6.2	26969	14373	15505
Waldo	5.5	25849	11000	17286
Siskiyou	6.9	20969	9854	9359

Table 2. Harvest season duration and yield of Black Diamond and other varieties (planted in 2001 and 2002, harvested in 2003)
Cultivar	Yield, kg/ha	Harvest season
Cultivar	Yield, kg/ha	5%	Peak	95%
Black Diamond	17281	July 11	July 21	August 6
Nightfall	14384	July 11	July 25	August 6
Silvan	12106	July 11	July 21	August 3
Marion	10382	July 11	July 21	August 6
Siskiyou	9656	July 11	July 21	July 31
Boysenberry	8670	July 16	July 25	July 31
Metolius	8480	July 11	July 21	July 25
Waldo	7112	July 21	July 31	August 6

Table 3. Averaged harvest season duration of Black Diamond and other varieties for several years (2001-2003 harvested)
Cultivar	Harvest season
Cultivar	5%	Peak	95%
Black Diamond	June 28	July 8	July 21
Nightfall	July 3	July 11	July 23
Silvan	June 26	July 8	July 21
Marion	July 3	July 10	July 22
Siskiyou	June 25	July 8	July 25
Obsidian	June 25	July 4	July 15
Black Pearl	July 3	July 10	July 24
Metolius	June 25	July 3	July 14
Waldo	July 8	July 22	August 7