my first strawberry!!

[Smart Red]

Ya'll living warmer than I am. The best I can say is that I got my first strawberry. . . .


. . . . flower yesterday. And those are on the Alpine strawberries. My large berries have yet to start setting buds.


Knowing how much better home grown strawberries taste than those big, red cardboard berries they sell at the grocery, you were wise to get to it first! Yum?

 

[MontyJ]

Mine are flowering like crazy. I even have a few green berries. We may have a frost on Monday so I'll take the precaution and cover them.

 

[baymule]

A frost on Monday? Wow. it has already hit 85 here with nowhere to go but up.

 

[so lucky]

So, why do you have to move them every 3 years?

 

[MontyJ]

So, why do you have to move them every 3 years?

To reduce fungal/disease buildup in the soil. Strawberries are very susceptible to several soil born diseases. Rotating them helps reduce the problem.

 

[Stubbornhillfarm]

I'm wondering if the having to move them due to fungus, etc is regional. Meaning, my great uncle had an acre of strawberry gardens for at least 30+ years. Always the same spot. There are huge farms up here that have acres of strawberrys. They don't move them. I've had strawberries off and on my whole life and never heard that you had to move them.

Is it possible that some different climates have to move them and other don't? Just wondering.

Enjoy those berries StoneyGarden. My plants are just barely cresting the soil.

 

[GrowLightGuy]

What ya gonna do with it?


Hey... just wondering.. if you pick the seeds off, can you plant them?

There's very few you can actually do this with. Hybrids and day neutrals, which is mostly what's on the market, no. They don't grow true from seed.

 

[MontyJ]

I'm wondering if the having to move them due to fungus, etc is regional. Meaning, my great uncle had an acre of strawberry gardens for at least 30+ years. Always the same spot. There are huge farms up here that have acres of strawberrys. They don't move them. I've had strawberries off and on my whole life and never heard that you had to move them.

Is it possible that some different climates have to move them and other don't? Just wondering.

Enjoy those berries StoneyGarden. My plants are just barely cresting the soil.

I've also seen strawberry patches in the same place for years without a problem. I never move mine either. I would venture to say that the larger producers fumigate their soil to protect their crop.

 

[bobm]

In Cal. , where they grow acre upon acre of commercial strawberries, one sees row upon row of plastic that covers the soil that was fumigated with Methy bromide to get rid of nematodes. Then they cut slits in the plastic to plant the strawberry starts.