Top Tips on growing Strawberries
Strawberries
There are a wide variety of strawberry plants and these are broken down into two types:
60 Day type
Within the 60 day type plants you also have early, mid-season and late- cropping varieties. The main difference in the two types is that 60 day will have one flowering and fruiting period within 60 days and then the crop finishes for the year. Best current varieties are ‘Elsanta’, ‘Sonata’ and ‘Malling Centenary’.
Everbearer type
An everbearer type strawberry will continue to flower and fruit throughout the year, with both fruits and flowers on the plant at the same time. In commercial cropping, growers use both types to provide continuity of fruit as both will produce similar levels of fruit over a season. The best current varieties of everbearer type strawberry are ‘Everest’, ‘Buddy’ and ‘Albion’.
Both types of strawberry can be purchased as either: bare-rooted plants lifted from soil beds or grown in containers.Don’t worry about sounding professional. Sound like you. There are over 1.5 billion websites out there, but your story is what’s going to separate this one from the rest. If you read the words back and don’t hear your own voice in your head, that’s a good sign you still have more work to do.
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Best soil for Strawberries
Strawberries can be grown in a wide range of soils, from light sands to heavy clay, but they prefer rich fertile soil that is well-drained and rich in organic matter. They love soils with plant compost added which gives them steady nutrition. The soil needs to be dug over, cleared of weeds and mounded into beds or in raised beds to avoid water-logging. Strawberries grow like grasses in that the growing point is at the bottom of the plant and it sends up leaves and flowers from a base ‘crown’ so drainage is very important to avoid plant rotting.