Strawberries?

[Victoria]

I want to do strawberries on my porch. Any tips or pointers? Should I buy a plant or plant seeds?

[Petee]

I've never heard of anyone starting strawberries from seed, just starter plants.

 

Strawberries will do well anywhere that they get lots of sunshine, good drainage and proper feeding.  That said it takes a lot of plants to furnish more than an occasional handful or a one time cereal bowl full.  June bearing berries produce most of their berries one time in June.  Other types produce in smaller amounts several times a year.  

 

If you have a lot of planters on your deck then you might get quite a few berries but the plants usually won't last over the winter unless they are in a raised bed and mulched properly.  Even then the plants are at their best for only a couple of years.

 

Here's a good link:

http://gardening.about.com/od/fruitsberriesnuts/a/Strawberries.htm

[lavender]

I'm assuming you want to do it for decoration and for fun. Get one of those strawberry jars; the ones with the holes for planting all around the jar. You fill it to the first level with good potting soil, slide the plant in the first opening and continue adding soil to the second opening, put the plant in there and so on. You can put 2-4 plants in the top depending on the size of the jar. These are great for the small Alpine strawberries but they are hard to come by.

[lavender]

Just to clarify if anyone really cares or is a wild strawberry picker. The cultivated version of Alpine strawberry is hard to come by around here. Our wild strawberries are Fragaria vesca, which is what you are going to find if you look up Alpine strawberry. What the difference is I do not know. Probably like going out and digging up wild Shasta daisies or black-eyed Susan's. Nice but not up to the standards of the cultivated ones.

[Victoria]

I want to plant them to eat!! I just want to keep the critters out of them.

 

Can I go dig up wild black-eyed susans and re-plant them?

[Cardinal Fan]

What about those planters that hang upside down on your deck and the plants look like they are inside some type of plastic bag. They had them advertised for tomatos, but now they have strawberries too. Has anyone had any luck with them? Are the tomatos good?

[sunflake]

What about those planters that hang upside down on your deck and the plants look like they are inside some type of plastic bag. They had them advertised for tomatos, but now they have strawberries too. Has anyone had any luck with them? Are the tomatos good?

JUst bought one yesterday for tomatos.  They did have strawberries and red hot peppers.  Hope they work.

 

[lavender]

I want to plant them to eat!! I just want to keep the critters out of them.

 

Can I go dig up wild black-eyed susans and re-plant them?

You are not going to get a lot of strawberries out of a planter of any sort but you'll get enough for hand eating or maybe a shortcake if you can get them all to ripen close together.

You sure can go dig the wild black-eyed Susan's, also the Shasta daisies and the Dame's Rocket (the pink and purple thing that looks like phlox.) All are great plants. The wild black-eyed Susan's tend to be a bit floppier than the cultivated ones but you can't kill them if you beat them with a stick. Like the Dame's Rocket they tend to overgrow everything. They spread by runner and also reseed. The Dame's Rocket reseeds all over the place. Shasta daisies are a bit better behaved. Wild flower gardens are a thing of beauty but they are somewhat hard to control.