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| Name |
Strawberries |
| Price |
£ 1.25 / each |
| Colours | red |
| Size | Height: 20cm/8inches
Spread: 23cm/8inches |
| Aspect | An open site in full sun will give you the best strawberries. |
| Care | They prefer a free draining sandy loam, with good levels of organic matter. However, soil should not be too fertile, as this will encourage leafy growth, inhibiting the fruiting. Plant so that the crown is just above the soil surface, and firm in with your knuckles. They need adequate water, but soil should never be waterlogged. Try to avoid watering the leaves. Put straw around the base of the plants, to prevent fruits from rotting. Cover with nets/fleece to prevent birds from taking the fruit. Slugs also like the ripening fruit, so you may need to put some organic slug pellets down. After 3 years, strawberries must be moved to a different spot (crop rotation, which minimises pests and diseases). Grow annuals or salad crops in the old strawberry site, and then move the strawberries back there after 3 years. Once all the fruit has been harvested, cut the foliage, leaving only a few centimetres of stalk and spread a bucket of mulch (garden compost) every sq m to encourage healthy re-growth. |
| Uses | -easy to grow
-grow well in containers (no need to rotate the crop, only change the soil)
-look good when grown at the front of beds and borders |
| Description | There is little better than eating your own, sun warmed strawberries, fresh from the garden. They are so much sweeter and tastier than shop bought ones. They are also pretty easy to grow, and can look good a beds/borders with herbaceous plants. |
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