Strawberry runners?

[tankgirl73]

What do you do with strawberry runners?

I started a couple dozen new strawberry plants this year. They're Seascape, a variety where you're actually allowed to harvest fruit the first year. We didn't get HUGE production (bad year weather-wise too) but we got some nice ones, and are still getting an odd one here or there (day-neutral variety).

They're also supposed to produce fewer runners than most varieties, so they're good for pots. All of mine are in pots -- generally 3 plants per large pot, some pots are round and I have a couple that are long rectangles.

Anyway, they are just throwing runners left right and center now! It's very cool. I've never grown strawberries so it's fun to watch how this develops. There are little plant shoots every 6"-12" along a runner, and they just go on and on forever, looking for a place to set root... and even starting to grow leaves and baby plants without a home of their own yet.

It reminds me of the spider plants we had growing up, now that I think about it...

A couple have actually found a place to root, one from a round pot found its way into a neighbouring long pot and set up housekeeping. And one from the other long pot found a home in the same pot, two plants over from its mom. They're well-rooted now, I just discovered this today, hadn't noticed it before.

My question is, what do I do with all the runners? What are my options? Do I trim them off to encourage the mother plants to grow larger (they're all still fairly small)? If I want to use them for new plants, how do I "harvest" them? How tightly can I pack them into the pots, should I try adding a fourth? As I said, they're fairly small, but I'm sure they'll just get bigger and bigger next year. I'd love to plant even more, and give some to my mom, etc... just need the instructions.

[lmonter]

The lazy way? Shove the runners back into the soil in your pots. Once they've taken hold (aka, have roots), you can cut the plant runners away, separate your plants to space them out better, and viola! Five times as many strawberry plants!

You need to let the baby runner plants put down some roots before you snip the runners though - kind of like you don't want to clip your baby's umbilical cord before babe's born. If that makes sense.

You can certainly trim off the baby plants if you want, but I'm all for letting 'em go wild. I say you can never have too many strawberries. But that's just me.

[birthgreeter]

:

we let ours go and start new plants with them. most plants are in their best production for about 3 years anyway, so new plants are needed!

[tankgirl73]

You need to let the baby runner plants put down some roots before you snip the runners though - kind of like you don't want to clip your baby's umbilical cord before babe's born. If that makes sense.

It does make sense, thank you. I would have just snipped them THEN tried to plant them, so this is exactly the information I needed.

So I let them root wherever, 'cut the cord' when they're well-established... and THEN I dig up the whole thing (leaves, roots and all) and replant wherever.

I was aware of the 3-year lifespan of strawberries, but hadn't yet really figured out how I'd deal with it with my pots. Now I'm thinking, add one or two new plants to each pot -- and maybe it would have been better to start with 2 instead of 3 -- so there's some overlap. And get some new pots for the rest of them.

Or maybe I should build yet another raised bed and dedicate it to strawberries...

Oh, that brings me to another question. What's the proper thing to do with strawberries come winter? Do I just leave them? Do I cut them back at some point? Do I cover them? (We're in eastern Canada so when I say winter I do mean winter lol...)

[lmonter]

Well, since they're in pots, they'll potentially stay warmer than if they were in the ground. I live a hop, skip, and a jump from the Canadian border (less than two hours). And have left strawberries just in the ground and they overwintered just groovy. I did throw some straw on top to help insulate them one year, but eh.

Now, I've got 1.5-2 raised beds of strawberries. I didn't do squat to winterize them last year. If I'd had the energy, I might've mowed some straw to mulch them again really well (would've helped with the weeds, too!!). Or you can just throw loose straw on 'em, and just know you'll have to rake the straw up in the spring so they can grow and all that jazz.

A farm across the county from me just mows down the spent plants, leaving just the crown. That way there's no dead leaves/runners to clip. But they have 5 acres of strawberries. Been debating having hubby do something similar to one of the beds with the lawnmower or weed-whacker set to a high level to see how it works.

[cristeen]

Don't overcrowd your pots. I discovered the hard way that strawberries do not care for over-crowding at all. I put 1 plant in a 10 inch (round) pot and it got huge. Whereas the same breed put 2 or 3 in that 10-inch pot never got very big at all. I have 2 plants in a 14-inch long pot and that seems to be good for them - but I don't think a third plant would work. Everything I'd read said that strawberries don't mind small spaces, but my experience has not shown that at all. I lost all my plants last year and had to start over from fresh this spring, and already in half a season the plants are bigger than even my 4 year old plants ever got.

As for the runners - let them root and then before activity starts in the spring, divide. You can see exponential growth in your number of plants... I went from 2 plants to over 4 dozen in a few years (before I killed them all).

[tankgirl73]

Ahh... so should I wait until they've overwintered before chopping them up and replanting? I guess that makes sense because that's when the nurseries are selling the baby plant cuttings - in the spring.

I had the idea of taking a bunch of my peat pots, maybe the larger 4" ones, and setting them out for the runners to root in. Otherwise I'm not sure where to put them all to take root -- I'd worry about disturbing the existing plants when it comes time to dig them up.

For overcrowding, this particular variety is supposed to be happy at closer quarters than most varieties -- like, you can put 3 in the space where other varieties would put 2. I will be careful about not doing more than that, though.

DH is suggesting I put them "wild" -- along the side of the house or along the back edge of the yard (where it's woodsy), and just leaving it to luck and see what happens, how well they do. I'm iffy about this, since I really don't know what the soil is like... I put some of my "extra" green beans alongside the house just to see what they would do, and they grew alright and have even given me a few beans, but only two of 7 actually survived long enough to flower -- the others were RAVAGED by slugs and possibly other bugs or who knows what else.

Perhaps after another year, when I have lots and LOTS of strawberry plants, I won't mind a sacrificial experimentation like that. I think for now, though, I'll play it safe.

[Rhiannon Feimorgan]

I live well north of you, zone 2a and my strawberries over winter well with no special treatment. They are in the ground though, not in pots. If you have the space, you can bury the pots up to the edge in the ground to help protect them over the winter. Pots above ground are more open to damage from freezing. Another option would be to put them in a cold room. Somewhere that the pots won't freeze solid but not warm enough to break dormancy. You can transplant the strawberries any time after they become dormant. Usually after the first hard frost. I transplanted a bunch last fall and they did wonderfully. They fruited earlier and had a better crop than the ones I planted in the spring.

Nurseries are selling baby strawberries in the spring because that's when people are buying them, not necessarily because it's best for the plants. Most fruit bearing plants do best if planted in the fall. I think because they get an earlier start in the spring.

If you have the space to let them go wild, you can build up quite a strawberry patch in a few years. In pots though it's probably better to cut back the runners. It will let the plant put more energy into making fruit.