Grow your own strawberries

By Matt S., Pitt County Extension Director and Horticulture Agent
Pick-your-own strawberry farms are a great place for a family to spend a few hours outdoors, picking berries to take home and eat, bake with, or freeze. In Eastern North Carolina, strawberry season typically starts in early to mid-April and lasts until late May or early June. Those dates fluctuate, depending on weather. Pitt County is blessed to have many farms and farm stands where you can pick or buy strawberries.

Many of you reading this may be interested in growing strawberries in your home garden as well. The way we grow strawberries in home gardens is a little different than how they are typically grown on farms. Strawberries are a perennial plant, meaning an individual strawberry plant will survive the winter and last for many years. They should be planted in a spot in the garden that has good soil with proper drainage and a lot of sun. This will ensure they grow and remain healthy for many years.

Freshly picked strawberries, photo
by fikretozk/iStock

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When buying strawberry plants, they will usually be sold as bare root plants. Bare root literally means that the plants will not be in a container and there will be no soil packed around the roots. You will buy a bundle of plants (usually 25) that  are  nothing  but  roots,  stems, and leaves, and they will likely be packed in moist straw or newspaper.

Many varieties of strawberry plants are available; the ones we recommend for homeowners in North Carolina are ‘Galletta’ ‘Chandler’ and ‘Jewel.’ I also personally like ‘Earliglow’ which is an older variety with small but extremely sweet fruit.

Plant the strawberry plants in a straight row, with each plant spaced 1 foot apart from the next. Therefore if you have 25 plants, you will need 25 feet of row space.  If you plant the strawberry plants in a small square or patch, the plants in the center will not get enough sun to produce good fruit.
 
After the strawberry plants have been planted, they will begin to develop runners.  Runners are stems that grow sideways rather than upright, and as they spread, new plantlets, or daughter plants, will form from each main plant, or mother plant. Over the course of the summer, your row of plants will fill in and become a thick row of strawberry leaves. Try to keep the rows less than 18 inches wide by placing the runners within that area as they grow.

Galletta strawberries, recommended for Eastern North Carolina

Earliglow strawberries, also for NC. Small and extremely sweet.

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During the first year after planting, you want to encourage as much vegetative growth as possible by picking off any flowers that form. This will mean that you will not have fruit during the first year, but will have a much greater amount of berries in following years.

For homeowners, it is usually sufficient to control weeds by pulling, hoeing, or lightly mulching with straw. Herbicides should not be necessary. Test your soil before planting, and follow fertilizer recommendations.  If no soil test was taken, apply 1 pound of 10-10-10 per 25 feet of row before planting.
 
By this time the following year, you should be ready to harvest fresh berries in your own backyard.  After the rows have finished providing fruit for the year, you can thin them to 12-18 inches, and clip or mow off the leaves (being careful not to damage the crowns of the plant). This will help them regenerate new growth for the following year.

Matthew Stevens is the County Extension Director and Horticulture Agent for North Carolina Cooperative Extension’s Pitt County Center.  If you have questions about this article or gardening in general, please contact the Pitt County Extension Master Gardener Infoline at 252-902-1705.