Topic: Strawberries

[Shirley]

:)Hallo old friends and new.  A couple of years ago I grew strawberries from seed, type Sarian.  They taste OK and are only need to add to my breakfast.  As yet, these plants have not produced any runners.  Is this normal?  Should I scrap these plants now and grow some more from seed.  Or can you recommend another type.  I really don't want a field of plants, just a few to provided me with a daily supply of fruit.

[Palustris]

The type of strawberries which one normally grows from seed are  Alpine. They do not produce runners like the big dessert ones. If your plants have stopped producing good quantities of fruit then sow some more seed. If they are still productive, feed in February with Tonk's Rose fertiliser type stuff and keep on enjoying them.

[Shirley]

Thanks for reply, Eric.  These strawberries are not Alpine, but Dessert Type.  The seed is an F1 from mail order seed catalogue.

[Palustris]

The non production of runners is a bit odd then. It may be that they have been bred not to. Same thing applies,  strawberries fruit well for about 3 years, but we have some that came from my father's garden 20 years ago which fruit better than some of the newer varieties.

[budgiebreeder]

Love ya cat.Sometimes the old ones are best.

[ina]

Hi Shirley,
If you just need a few plants, why don't you just get some runners from someone or buy the first plants from a garden shop? This way you will be sure to have runners next season.

I plant runners from my old plants every year in the first half of August (my lottie neighbor tells me they HAVE to be planted before the 15th of August). The old plants go on the compost.

Last year, I planted a new bed from runners as I do every year but kept half the bed of old plants just to see the difference. I was not impressed with the yield of the old plants so it's new plants for me every year. I was so hoping I could keep plants for two or three years like many people do, it would save me a lot of work but it doesn't seem to work for me.