Growing Strawberries
Choosing which plants
There are 2 varieties of strawberries, June bearing and everbearing. The June bearing will only produce around June and not again until the next year. Everbearing produce sporadically all summer. I have both varieties and from my experience I have found the June bearing produce larger berries, while the everbearing produce smaller berries, but more often.
Using Bird Netting
The best way to keep your strawberries safe is to fashion a bird netting cover. This method is pretty low maintenance and still allows the bees to get to the flowers. I use a bird netting with about 1 inch squares to allow for larger bees. I started with a metal fencing frame and covered it with the netting, leaving a door in the front for me to crawl in to retreive my berries.
After the first season I quicky learned these plants love to roam. I decided to build a raised bed to contain them easier.
As you can see, they populated the entire bed rather quickly. This led to my biggest strawberry noob mistake.
Strawberry Sap Beetles
I missed a few berries and they got over-ripe. I decided to leave them in to allow the nutrients to decompose back into the bed. Apparently doing this is like sending out an invitation for the dreaded Strawberry Sap Beetle. Once these little brown bugs smell your strawberry patch they will not only eat the rotting berries, but they will also start eating new berries just before they are ripe enough to pick.
Sorry the picture is so blurry. I will try to take a clearer one if they ever return. I hope I don't get the opportunity though.
Growing strawberries out in the open
I have found a way to protect my strawberries on plants that are growing in the open, but it takes alot more time and effort. I use the bag netting that comes with fresh produce such as onions and limes and cut it in half. I then wrap it around bunches of berries after they begin forming and before they are ripe enough for birds to want them.
Needless to say, I am building another raised bed to get the rest of my strawberries under the much lower maintenance bird netting. I leave the bird netting on my raised bed all year round and in the middle of the third winter it is still in good condition.
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