The first strawberries of the season

I have just harvested my first strawberries this year, Yum! Every year I am suprised by the smell and taste of home grown strawberries. Unlike every other fruit and vegetable I know, the aroma of strawberries has very little to do with their taste. They somehow smell earthy – in a nice way. The taste is sheer heaven. Shop bought strawberries are tasteless by comparison.

Growing strawberries should be a three year rotation event. The first year, you cut any runner off and will get a small to reasonable crop of strawberries. The second year you again cut the runners off and should get a very good harvest. The third year the harvest will be great and you use the runners to make new plants for the next year. After three years, strawberry plants will become less vigorous and you will get smaller harvests.

You get new strawberry plants very easily. The main plants will produce ‘runners’ which are long stems which, if left the their own devices will produce growths and roots along its length. What you do is dig these new growths into pots and bury the pots in the ground (just because they are easier to manage that way). When the roots have formed (or at the end of th4e season), cut the runner off from the main plant and you have new strawberry plants. It really is that easy.If you just leave the runners they will just produce loads of new plants but your patch of ground will become overcrowded and cease to produce as many fruits.

The reason for cutting runners off the main plants in -previous years is that you do not want the plant to put energy into producing offspring when they should be producing delicious fruit for you.

There are a number of ways to grow strawberries. You can grow them in your garden as normal crops. You can even grow them in flower beds. They are quite attractive plants and will not look out of place, the flowers are white and quite pretty. There is a small problem that slugs and snails love strawberries and you really want to protect the fruit from mud. The conventional way of doing this is to put a mat (or straw) around the plant.

Another way of growing strawberries is in a specially designed sytrawberry planter. This in effect is a large pot with holes in the sides for the plants. Planters are, in fact rather nicer looking than that and are designed to look good even when not covered with plants. The problem always used to be to get water down to the plants at the bottom of the planter whilst not drowning the top plants. However many modern plants now have watering systems built in to cure this problem. If yours does not, then put a piece of drain pipe down the centtre of the planter with small hols in it at intervals and water the planter through that.

You can also plant  strawberries in hanging baskets or pouches. In some ways this makes a lot of sense, The strawberries are then up at the level where you can easily see (and pick) them. No more back-ache!.

My strawberry plants were already in the garden when I moved into the house and although they readily produce runners (a bit too readily really – they’re a bit like weeds, grow everywhere) they do not produce a great deal of fruit. Those they do produce is really tasty but not enough of it. So I think it is time to replace them.

I have found a great offer from Van Meuren which offers 24 strawberry plants in two different varieties fruiting at different times plus a Patio planter plus a growing pouch and 100g of fertiliser. This is apparantly worth about £55 and they are offering it for £15. So I have ordered a pack and will await the results with interest. I will not dispose of my old plants until the new ones are well grown, just in case there are any problems but I have bought from this company before and do not see any problems arising.

If you have never grown strawberries before I would not hesitate to suggest you give it a try. You can grow just one plant and see how you get on. The resultant fruit really is so much better than any you can buy, it is worth the small amount of work involved.