North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

["Raby, Brian" <brian.raby@roche.com>]

Melissa,

 

Rivka beat me to the point… if you google “renovating strawberries” many of the web sites mention this process.  

 

Rivka, I did mow fairly soon after harvest was done.  I was also careful about how close to the crown I mowed.  When done, I spread 10-10-10 over the rows and generously watered it in.

 

Brian

 

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From: nafex-bounces@lists.ibiblio.org [mailto:nafex-bounces@lists.ibiblio.org] On Behalf Of Road's End Farm
Sent: Tuesday, July 21, 2009 9:29 AM
To: North American Fruit Explorers
Subject: Re: [NAFEX] Strawberry runners

 

On Jul 21, 2009, at 9:16 AM, Melissa Kacalanos wrote:

Why would you mow strawberries? It sounds like something a nursery would tell you to do to prevent your strawberries from runnering.

It's fairly standard practice, at least according to most of what I've read on the subject; the old leaves die off after harvest anyway, and it's supposed to reduce disease pressure by having the old leaves break down faster, instead of hanging dead on the plant. I've never had any problem with plants refusing to runner afterwards. You need to do it fairly soon after the end of harvest, though, before the new leaves have grown; and mow high, so you don't damage the crowns; maybe the ones that wouldn't runner were mowed too late or too low?. -- I haven't actually seen much difference between years that I do mow them and years that I don't.

--Rivka
Finger Lakes NY; zone 5 mostly