Strawberries - Why so many runners? Why so little fruit!?

[chappy]

Hi All,

I have quite a few strawberry plants (approx 30) which were all grown from 4 original plants over a couple of years.
The varieties are a spread of early to lates.  Honeye, Florence, Cambridge Favourite and Hapil.

Most are in two strawberry jars/pots, the others in a half whiskey barrel.  But the same ratio do the same in both containers.

I had fed them with seaweed extract until they started to flower and then switched to a weekly (sometime slightly longer) high potash feed.

Can anyone explain why so many might not even attempt to grow flowering/fruiting growth and have gone straight to producing runners? I'd say only 10 have actually produced any fruit, mainly the gardeners delight (which do taste the best to be honest :) ) .

As we're having such good weather, if I were to cut of the runners, might the plants try to produce fruit?

This trend has happened each year since I first bought the parent plants.

Any ideas?

Cheers,

Chappy.

[chappy]

[Squash64]

I'd like to know the answer to this too.  I don't think I am looking after mine quite as well as you are but they are weedfree and watered.  All new plants last Autumn.  I doubt if I've even picked 1 pound of fruit from around 50 plants but they are all producing runners like mad.

I wonder if it's because they are young plants?

[chappy]

I wonder if it's because they are young plants?

To be honest the worst of the bunch (2nd strawberry jar) were only planted up this year, so you might be on the right lines.  The 2nd jar has two year old plants are doing a little better.  That one has mainly Cambridge favourites in it.

So I'll maybe try to get as many runners of CF for next year.  Maybe the earlier and later varieties have not liked the conditions this year?!

[landimad]

What I did was to grow them on into 6" pots before putting them into their final position.
I also keep removing the runners from each of the plants over the next two years so more energy is put into the fruiting. This then gives you good strong growers to which fruit is plentiful and the runners are then taken for the following years plants so the story starts all over again.

[valmarg]

I think, and I'm no expert (strawberries are on OH's JD/cv) ;D you should remove the runners on young plants so that the strength goes into producing fruit, rather than new plants.

valmarg

[landimad]

I am glad you understood what I was trying to say Valmarg  :-[

[calendula]

perhaps the soil they were in was too highly fed so they are making growth in other ways than in fruit - as for runners I always pegged mine in regardless of what the books say and I made another bed of strawberries completely for free  :o

also possible that the soil they are in is poor soil, complete opposite of too much food - I always think fruit does better when not in containers, they just get too cramped

[valmarg]

I am glad you understood what I was trying to say Valmarg  :-[

Ooops sorry landimad.  I hadn't read your reply when I replied.

valmarg

[jennym]

Think calendula has hot the nail on the head - I've found that if there's too much nitrogen around in the soil, or you're feeding with a high nitrogen feed, then they will produce more leaf/runners than fruit.
I agree about containers, and about runners, my strawberries are grown in the ground and allowed to form a mat, with runners being kept.
Must admit that if I want runners from a particular plant, then I try and allow no more than 3 runners, cutting off the rest, but haven't really noticed any decrease in fruit on plants left to produce runners as they please.

[caroline7758]

Just hijacking this thread  ::) to ask, how close can you plant strawberries?

[calendula]

myself - I pack them in  :D not only do they seem just fine but the closer they are the more foliage and this fools the birds cos they can't see them so well (don't net at all), then any runners I just shove in the ground - don't like to see empty space  ;D - if it didn't work i wouldn't do it