How to Grow Strawberries

Annie
by Annie
2 Materials
$20
1 Hour
Easy

Strawberries can be grown in containers on your patio or in a garden bed in your yard. Or, you can grow them in gutters hung vertically on a stand, or planted in soil along the edge of your patio.



After all, who doesn't like fresh strawberries in the spring and summer? Here's how we started a new garden bed for our strawberries.

This bed had already been used for growing vegetables. So, I just made sure to dig out all of the weeds.


The soil in this bed was in pretty good shape, but we did spread out a few inches of compost on top.

Then I dug a hole to put the new strawberry plant in. I like to get the hole ready before transplanting so the roots don't have a chance at all to dry out. I also like to put a hand shovel's worth of compost right in the hole.


Whether you bought your strawberry plants in a garden pot or a cardboard sleeve, once you remove them, plant them right away.

Strawberry roots dry out very quickly as a lot of dirt falls away from the roots when you remove them from their container. Don't leave them exposed for long to the air.


Plant your strawberries about 10 inches apart; over time they will get bigger and start sending out runners. These runners eventually find soil, root them selves and grow new plants.

Once your strawberry plants settle in and start to grow, they will begin to flower. Those flowers turn into strawberries.


Make sure to water the bed or strawberry tower container regularly; strawberries are made up of a lot of water! So water every few days and berries will start forming and growing.


You will also begin to see strawberry runners forming.

Here is a runner - the mother plant is in the lower part of the photo. See the runner? The stem leading away from the mother?


Once the runner touches soil, it will start to root. Leaves will grow and eventually there will be flowers and berries too.


Once those runners are rooted, you can snip the long stem at either end. Now you've got yet another strawberry plant!

BUT, there are a few things to know about how to deal with the runners properly. If you don't, you could soon be overwhelmed with lots of strawberry plants...and small berries.


If you want to know more about the right planting depth for strawberries (too deep isn't good) and how to deal with all the runners, head over to the website for the full deal.


Country Living in a Cariboo Valley also shares the #1 tip you NEED to know, in order to grow huge strawberries!

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Annie
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  • Cheryl Cheryl on May 01, 2019

    What’s the best way to keep the birds from eating all your strawberries?

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  • Annie Annie on May 10, 2019

    Maybe you are watering too much (because they are going moldy)? You could try watering less but putting down mulch around the plants. Something like straw would work well. This would also keep the berries from touching the ground, which also may be helping the rot.

  • Brandi Hanvy Brandi Hanvy on May 13, 2019

    Use some cinnamon sprinkled around and it will help with fungus or mold 😊

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