first time strawberries

16 years ago

I have never grown them before, but I want to. I have raised beds that are 8'x3.5'. I plan to rotate my crops every year, and if I don't rotate the berries too, it will mess up all my other rotations.

Here's what I am thinking. Will it work and give me decent yields?

I am thinking of growing Surecrop that is a June bearing berry. Would it work to pick them in the early summer, let them grow through the summer and then dig out the runners (for fresh plants) and transplant them into a new bed each fall. I would dispose of the "mother" plants at that time.

The information I read said to cut off the first blooms, so I assume that means I would leave the plants in the beds for two years on the first rotation, but would move them every year thereafter.

Will this work?

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Comments (5)

homertherat
16 years ago
You need to get June bearing varieties if you want to be able to rotate them every year. Most sources will tell you that you shouldn't transplant runners because they can carry diseases and whatnot.

You should be able to replant new ones every year and get a decent crop. However, that could get expensive unless you don't really care about the chance to breed disease in your strawberries. In my opinion, it would be easier to just leave them for 3 years then replace them, but it sounds like it wouldn't work for you.
anney
16 years ago
DonnaB

I believe you should not harvest any strawberries the year you plant them and wait until the next year, though many people don't give them that extra year. But I doubt they'll produce anything for you if you uproot and plant them in another bed next year. The runners will be just like the first year plants you set out this spring, so you'd always be behind!

I'm thinking of growing Alpine strawberries this year, probably in containers on my back deck that are 8" deep, and 26" long x 18" wide, totes cut in half horizontally. There are all kinds of containers that can be used for growing regular strawberries, so maybe you can find something that you can leave in place for at least two years and use the garden plot for something else.
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homertherat
16 years ago
I wish there was an edit function...

Strawberry jars are good looking and they do the trick. Of course, you won't get many berries from one jar. I suppose having one bed just for strawberries would be the best solution, albeit an impractical one.
anney
16 years ago
Homer

I've also seen those strawberry bags that are hung on fences or wall.

This woman tried them but wasn't too happy with them. But she decided to make her own "tubular growing devices" for strawberries the next year. They require watering every day, but otherwise are pretty neat.
homertherat
16 years ago
Anney

I saw those a while back, but watering every day didn't appeal to me, plus you can't fit many plants in a tube. I love strawberries, so I would need half a dozen or more tubes to satisfy my strawberry needs. I'm going with a 4x4 for alpines because that would be easiest to cover and protect from birds.

Last year I made a clay strawberry pot in my ceramics class in high school and it worked well enough, but it wasn't wide enough to keep any moisture in. The summer heat drained any water out of it by the end of the day, so it wasn't very productive. It was basically one of those tubes, but made out of clay instead of pipe. I really needed one more project and that seemed somewhat easy, so I went ahead and made it. I'm sure that if I had made it 3 inches wider, it would be a great pot.