Feeding strawberries

[cal]

Hi everyone

On Friday I bought some Elan strawberry plants and have planted them in a hanging basket in Asda compost. The plants are still small and have no flowers. Do I wait for them to flower before I feed or should I start feeding now?

Thanks

[Alison]

If they're in fresh compost that should contain food for the first few weeks.


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[Potstubsdustbins]

Normally fresh compost would have enough nutrients for about 5-6 weeks.

However it would depend on how big your baskets were and how many plants you have in them.

[Moopmoop]

Out of curiosity cal, what do you intend to feed them with? I usually use tomato food but last year I bought some strawberry plant food, I don't think I saw much of a difference crop wise.

[Potstubsdustbins]

If you check the NPK of strawberry feed it is very similar to tomato feed, high in potash.

[Moopmoop]

There was however a difference price wise, the strawberry feed was a lot more expensive for a small bottle compared to a huge bottle of tomato food for a quid more than the strawb food!

[cal]

Out of curiosity cal, what do you intend to feed them with? I usually use tomato food but last year I bought some strawberry plant food, I don't think I saw much of a difference crop wise.

I'm going to use tomato food.

I'm going to hang on a few weeks before I start feeding them. I've got three strawberry plants in a 12" basket.

[AllInContainers]

I potted up all my strawbs failry recently, so I haven't fed them yet. When I do (prob mid next month) I'll be giving them a general purpose liquid feed until the first flowers start appearing. After that I'll switch to tomato food, with an occasional multipurpose feed. The reason I'll not be switching to tomato food at every feed, is I have got a mix of early, mid, late and everbearers in the pots, so I want to be sure the late cropping varieties still get their needs catered for as well as the earlier varieties

[Potstubsdustbins]

Cal with 3 plants per basket I would recommend you start feeding after about 4 weeks. If the plants have no fruit on them use a high nitrogen feed such as miracle grow, this will help give you good strong plants. When they flower and start to fruit change to your tomorite high potash for fruit growth.

[cal]

Thanks for the advice everyone.