To: North American Fruit Explorers <nafex@lists.ibiblio.org>
Subject: [NAFEX] strawberries
Date: Mon, 3 Mar 2008 13:41:15 -0500
couple of strawberry observations I will share -
the most important purpose of mulch is to keep the crown with the
already differentiated flower buds above critical temperatures - if
you can count on snow cover all winter, that's a fine mulch to serve
this purpose - there are mud control and weed control aspects of
mulch - 'Wheeler' rye straw has weed suppression properties, and
regular straw certainly provides a degree of weed suppression if it's
thick enough -
strawberry plants grow out of the ground as they age - each year the
plant wants/needs to put out new roots at the base of the crown -
after a couple of years, that critical area of the plant is out of
contact with soil, resulting in weak growth and poor cropping - a
simple way to keep young plants is to crop, direct runners into the
'road', then till the 'row' after the runners have rooted - fresh
plants each year by moving the row back and forth -
strawberries are also the weakest plants I know of - I do not know of
a plant they will out compete - they are heavy feeders tho, and
shallow rooted - - the first species to run out of water -
good crops only come from good management, nutrition, and religious
attention to watering -
D Doud - n/central indiana - first thaw of 2008 right now w/ rain - -