It's amazing how they go from inedible to very sweet, isn't it? If you first tasted a not quite ripe one, you would never want to try them again.
I finally got the little strawberry bed set up. It is fenced in, and if the birds start eating the berries, we will have to cover it with something that keeps the birds out and does not kill them. Last time we planted strawberries, the birds flew down and ate most of them, and after I killed one that got caught in the net we put over the strawberries, I just kind of quit growing them. This spring, Bobby took down the ramp from the back porch, and we are just using the back steps again, which left the space that was under the ramp at the side if the house empty and available for me to plant the strawberries. We have had cold and wet weather all spring, so it has taken me forever to get the strawberries planted and the little fence up around it so the dogs do not tramp over the berries. We should get a few berries this year, but next year, they should be all settled in and doing better.
This was not the best idea either, and last year, I ended up transplanting all of the strawberries into a plastic kiddie pool, with drain holes in the bottom. That worked well, but i just watched this video about planting the strawberries in gutters, where you can have them off the ground and easier to pick . I think that either @Bobby Cole could put them on shelves, like they describe in the video, or we might be able to just wire them right onto our chain link fencing, and then the berries would be much easier to pick than on the ground.
The biggest problem I find with planting them in gutters is keeping them watered, as there is not much soil water reserve in the shallow gutters. I find it hard to do, but growing greens and herbs is much easier.
Thank you. Edit: Of course, if she wants her berries in gutters i guess I can do that but then that nice, shiny, brand new cultivator I got late last year will have very little to do. Poor cultivator..
Okay, so Bobby doesn’t have to make gutter planters for the strawberries. I am going to put them in containers and a makeshift plastic pool again this year, so I only have to keep some water in the pool to know that the berries are watered, and not make sure each planter pot has water. I am going to put those plastic ribbons up to try and scare away the birds, so maybe WE can actually eat strawberries this year. Bobby can make a 4’x8’ frame, and I can lay plastic tarp inside, which will give me about a 4” tall “pool” to put the plant containers into. Burgess Seeds had a free-shipping special, so I ordered more strawberries, 2 black raspberries, and a red gooseberry bush. Working outside in the yard and garden gets harder for me each summer, so I am not going to be planting a little veggie garden anymore when I can’t keep up with all of it. I am going to try and do things that are perennial, once I get them planted. I will probably still plant a few cherry tomatoes since those are just SO much better than anything from the store, but the farmer market is where we will get the larger tomatoes.
Sorry, @Yvonne Smith. I have tried strawberries in gutters for years, and they always get very dry very quickly as soon as the sun hits them. If that happens here, I can imagine it would be worse in Alabama. You could rig up a constant drip irrigation system perhaps. Have you tried a strawberry tower? It would be even more work for @Bobby Cole but it would work better. Strawberry Tower
I agree, and that is what we decided when we talked about it. Even in the larger containers, it is hard to keep them damp enough in the heat of summer. Putting them into the little kiddie pools with a couple of inches of water at the bottom and keeping that filled seems to work the best. That is why we have decided that if Bobby takes three 8’ long boards, and makes a frame that is 4’x8’, then we line the inside with a plastic tarp, it will do the same thing as the plastic pools, and be easier to take down and save for the next year than the pools are.
a problem with strawberries are what to do with the little runners going everywhere. Ours weren't very sweet and after years of them jumping out of the garden, I gave a lot away and got rid of the rest. Worse is my beautiful red monarda and jerusalem artichokes.
We have currents and gooseberries growing wild here. And roses. My best current patch seems to be dying off. Something else seems to harvest the gooseberries and may apples. Wild roses can make for a pleasant afternoon picking the petals and drying them to add to tea in the winter. The smell is wonderful, as you can imagine.
We also have wild berries--roses, currants, and an assortment of others that probably don't grow in warmer climes. We have red and black domestic currants, but the moose love them, so if they don't get fenced off, they get eaten. Seaberries and serviceberries grow well here, as well as raspberries--both wild and domestic. We have wild blueberries galore, but we have not been able to get any of the domestic varieties to overwinter at our place.
We bought a few strawberries at local store here the other day. They were huge. Thought they would not have any taste but they were sweet and juicy .Showed as product of USA Indianapolis. Good 3-4 inches in diameter.
This spring, Bobby made me a 4x8 strawberry bed, and we filled it with leaves and household compost and then added a few bags of garden soil and manure. When I went out to see about planting some of the strawberries from the containers, i discovered that a huge colony of those tiny ants had moved into the strawberry bed. I didn’t have any borax, so I put Epsom salts on the bed, and a day or so later, they seemed to be gone. then the rain came and we just did not have any good weather to plant berries until this weekend. I happily started transplanting strawberries, and then discovered that my whole left leg was burning something awful……… sure enough, those ants had come back and were having any fits right where I was trying to plant berries. ! This time, I had borax, so I sprinkled some on the garden and around the grass in the edges, and then came in and put calamine lotion on my unhappy leg and foot. So now, I need to wait a while longer for them to move out again, but maybe I can plant a few more berries on the side where the ants didn’t move to.