Strawberry Plants

My 100 new strawberry plants are coming along nicely. Planted in the garden a week before a freak spring snowstorm I am surprised they made it at all. I picked most of the green berries off of these plants because I wanted them to concentrate on developing roots and not berries. Now that the spring rains have slowed down I hoed them good to remove any weeds and we are going down the rows adding rabbit poop and wheat straw mulch. 

This should help to keep their roots cool and keep most of the weeds down as well as helping to retain moisture.  For the remainder of the growing season these plants should now be able to concentrate on getting bigger and developing a good healthy root mass and large crown. 

But what about those runners that most strawberries put out? Well I am pinching them off! Again I want the plant to concentrate on building an extensive root system and crown this first year not fruit and reproducing. So I am pinching those off. 

But I am saving them!

Each small plantlet gets dipped into a rooting hormone and it's own small pot of moist potting mix.

They won't all root but some usually do. I will use these plants to fill in where I may have lost a plant or two along the rows and extend the row on out and add to my overall plant count.  You want these to root and get back in the ground QUICK in order for them to have enough time to get established before winter.  

I'll let you know how it goes but for now I have these babies tucked under my plant lights along with some new lettuce seedlings.

Blessings from The Holler

The Canned Quilter