Hi Eliza,
Many years ago my father (unknowingly) practiced a kind of no-dig with his raspberries in shade. Any green waste he had was thrown into his fruit cage. The result of this over the years, other than raising the soil level by 6 feet, was the production of rasp canes 8 foot tall. One of the summer jobs was bending over the canes and tying them down to a manageable height. The secret was, without doubt, water retention in the organic matter.
In Scotland I’ve seen raspberries thrive in the wild growing through gorse which shades the canes all year.
