im just starting growing my own in the garden and have a few strawberries that are almost ready to pick but the question is how often should i be feeding them with tomorite and also should i take the runners off or just leave them? also do i just throw them away at the end of the season or is there some way of saving them for next year?
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How often should i be feeding my strawberries?
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Runners will draw energy from the fruits and reduce the size of the plants for next year - reducing future cropping potential. Strawberries are at the peak cropping in years 2-4.
Fruits will draw energy from runners.
The plants only have so much energy - it's up to you how you use that energy. Remove what you don't want/need..
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I feed my strawberries which are in a tub once a week during the fruiting season but am not so good with the ones in the ground. Tend to use a general seaweed fertiliser or sometimes a weak tomato feed. I cut all the runners off while they're fruiting and then take one per plant (or a max of two) for the following year. Have always grown strawberries on a three year cycle. Year one (ie the first year after being a runner) they produce some fruit, year 2 they go a bit mad, year 3 isn't quite as good and then I replace in year 4. In order to do this I have 3 beds, each on a different year and replace one bed each year. That's how it works at home anyway. As it's my first year on the plot this year I only have one bed. Will be doubling my number with runners later this year to form a second bed next year and then on from that. Hope that this makes sense!
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Cut them back as far as you can, but a short length of stem remaining shouldn't cause a problem.
The less runners that you keep, the bigger and stronger will be the remaining runners, but they will still draw some energy from the fruits.
We have several small strawberry beds (for "parent plants" of each variety we grow) and the plants are allowed to grow, fruit or produce runners as they please. We then take runners each year and plant into barrels (easier to protect from pests than when in the ground). Older plants get binned as part of a rotation. The strawberries in the barrels are encouraged to fruit to the maximum and are not allowed any runners (since we have a stock of "mother" plants for that prupose)..
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I never fed mine either......last year was the first substantial crop we had. Didnt cut runners either. Wanting to plant a fair few runners this year as I have promised some to friends and neighbouring allotmenteers.
Got plenty of flowers on both my beds.....one of which is in its second year (wondered why they didnt get many fruit last year lol now I know!)
So hopefully lots of yummy fruit this year.
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over the years i have tried all the top tips people use with regards to feeding them and cutting runners etc. a few years ago i had a spare space on my allotment and decided to try a "wild" strawberry patch. i just planted some old plants and left them alone. trust me it was outstanding i got loads of big jucy tasty strawberris. i didnt feed, water or prune etc all i did was pick the fruit. i am not saying this is the best aproach but strawberris will grow almost anywhere with no or little care
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