Growing Strawberries

[Alice Johnson]

What are your tips for successful strawberry harvests?

[flynch]

Slug control
Woodlice control
Ant control
(Nematodes work well)
Netting to keep birds and squirrels out

[burnie]

Grow more than one variety, I have some outside in a bed and some in containers in the greenhouse, don't forget to move the whole lot to new ground every 4 or 5 years too.

[veggiechicken]

Picking them before anyone else does!

[It never rains..it pours]

Planting in black weed control fabric is an option. Done 50/50 here this year as a trial, as stopping weeds will be a joy and warming effects but downside Im told is need to load soil with manure, etc for 3 years growth in advance and slugs/vine weevil like the cover

[muck lover]

I’ve given up growing strawberries outside. I grow them in containers and hanging baskets which I bring into the polytunnel in January. Plus some in polytunnel raised beds. They are a lot of trouble compared to raspberries or currants but are so much better than shop bought berries! Worth the trouble definitely.

[TrixC]

Slug control
Woodlice control
Ant control
(Nematodes work well)
Netting to keep birds and squirrels out

How do you control woodlice? They’re the bane of my strawberry patch, I always thought they only ate dead and decaying matter until I caught them munching on my strawberries

[Martin H]

How do you control woodlice? They’re the bane of my strawberry patch, I always thought they only ate dead and decaying matter until I caught them munching on my strawberries

I could be wrong, but I don't believe woodlice get into the berries on their own - I think the slugs make the initial hole and the woodlice follow on behind. So if you keep the slugs off the woodlice won't be a problem.

Mind you I've never completely succeeded in keeping the slugs off...

[Chris11]

You usually get the largest harvest from 2nd or 3rd year plants.

So maintain a mix of plants each year. Remove oldest plants at the end of the 3rd or 4th year, and replace them with new ones on a rolling cycle.

You could buy new varieties to get a mix of tastes and peak season. Or just propagate new plants from the runners sent out from the old plants.

[4Shoes]

Go out and talk to the black birds all day... Will stop them eating them...

If not, netting, but think about how you will extract the berries.

If you have other soft fruit trees, think about a cage to cover them all.

I have a netting curtain frame, and another netting on a batten I lift over the top of the frame.

You should put down straw etc to keep them clean.

Other option is benchtop grow bags.....

Stuff a soaker down the centre of the bags. Plant strawberries. Soaker stops the bag drying out.
Fruit growers do it this way with drips in place of the soaker.

[TrixC]

I could be wrong, but I don't believe woodlice get into the berries on their own - I think the slugs make the initial hole and the woodlice follow on behind. So if you keep the slugs off the woodlice won't be a problem.

Mind you I've never completely succeeded in keeping the slugs off...

This seems to be a controversial topic. Even when I’ve had relatively low numbers of slugs I’ve still had a woodlice problem. I reckon the strawberry fruits are so soft the woodlice can eat them without help. The last couple of years I’ve had a great early strawberry crop, and would have had a second one in early autumn but lost most of them to the woodlice. I find I have to mulch heavily because my soil is clay and otherwise it dries out too much, but it does seem to encourage the wee blighters.

[Hereford fruit grower]

I have the unusual technique of growing strawberries as ground cover among other perennial plants including flowers and below small fruit and nut trees such as pears and hazels.

I basically just 'released' them into the garden and let them expand via runners. I don't know the variety for sure. It may possibly be Talisman. See past threads.

A lady gave me about eight plants in 2013. They now just about fill the area of garden to the north and east of the house. I've given away some runners because they're pretty enthusiastic about expanding into the available space and occasionally look too crowded, LOL.

They suffer appreciable slug damage in wet summers. But there are so many berries that one can afford to lose a few. If I didn't have enough, I'd use slug pellets.

There's little bird damage. I think they're possibly keener on eating insect pests and in season my blackcurrants. (Later in the season, they do go for apples.)

If the area is well-mulched, or enough leaf litter covers the ground, the berries don't get dirty. If there wasn't enough material between the berries and the soil, I'd definitely use straw.

[Peteyd]

A tip I picked up from my Granddad was to paint a dozen or so Strawberry sized stones red. Scatter the stones among the strawberry plants. keep them there all year round, the birds will see them, try and pick them, realize they are stones and leave them alone. Theory is that when the actual strawberries come, the birds wont bother with them because they will be so used to the red things being stones.

Not sure how effective it is in practice but I don't seem to lose any strawberries to the birds.. just the slugs, dog etc

[bikermike]

I grow mine right by my house 5' up in the air on a plastic shedlet in old plastic supermarket meat joint containers. You don't get the same yield as in the ground, but I lose a lot less to birds/slugs/etc