[sarah1983jane]

I forgot about a load of strawbs in the fridge that we picked at the local pick your own fruit farm at the weekend, they are now over ripe so I am thinking of planting them to see if I can get some lovely new strawbs?
looking on you tube it suggests various ways of taking the seeds off the fruit then it suggests freezing the seeds the planting out after a month or so in the freezer....this all sounds like a lot of work. Has anyone tried just planting the whole strawberry in compost and waiting to see what happens?
Any thought please?

Also was going to try the same with some gooseberries, just plant the whole fruit???

Advise please? Thanks

[Beetroot queen]

Gooseberries are easy, i snapped off a twig that was in my way and stuck it in a pot, new plant happily growing.

Not sure about strawberries, are they past freezing

[Charli]

I have grown strawberries from seed quite successfully, I didn't have to get them off the fruit though as someone else did that...

Gooseberries grow rather easily from cuttings, never tried from seed.

Sorry, I'm only half useful!

[RJR_38]

Sorry to hijack the thread but how many years would you have to wait to get fruit from a gooseberry cutting?

[BobE]

no more than 2 years, by year three it would be very productive.
But, plant up 4 or 5 at first.  Once you get them producinng you can discard the excess plants.

[RJR_38]

Ok, thanks. There is a gorgeous gooseberry bush on a neighbours plot but they don't know what variety it is (red, really sweet berries) so I might ask if I can take a cutting...

[BobE]

Ok, thanks. There is a gorgeous gooseberry bush on a neighbours plot but they don't know what variety it is (red, really sweet berries) so I might ask if I can take a cutting...

Take 5 or 6, it won't hurt it.  Big pot full of JI no 1, put the cuttings around the edge. TLC and bobs your uncle.

[allotmentann]

I have grown strawberry plants from the fruit, I just cut small slices and potted them up. They germinated fine, the problem I found (and this was true for the ones I grew from commercial packet seed), was that they grew very slowly, so I was left trying to overwinter dozens of teeny strawberry plants - and that I am afraid is where I failed! But they did germinate quite easily. Although from everything I have read they don't come true from seed, so you probably won't get what you sow!

[sarah1983jane]

cool, thanks guys
I think I will save my compost and pots for the runners.