[zestymordant]

Hi, been growing a couple of strawberry plants in our front yard just to see what would happen (previous owner of plot planted strawberries there so got some there )

This is what one looked like two days ago:



And what it looked like yesterday:



And for comparison, with the one still okay:



How could this have happened, and so quickly? I saw a couple of green fly looking things (greenfly?) in the pot when I noticed the plant had died yesterday but they couldn't have done it, surely?

[JayG]

What are the roots like? To go from apparently healthy to dead in 2 days suggests something has attacked it below soil level.

Unless I need to go back to Specsavers it's not a strawberry plant by the way (don't actually know what it is!) 

[GrannieAnnie]

I don't know what is wrong with it, apart from maybe too wet?  some of my outdoor tomatoes have gone like that, but taking a week rather than 2 days.

But I don't think it looks like a strawberry either!  pepper or chilli maybe?  similar leaves

[zestymordant]

Well they were bought from Wilko's as a pack of three strawberry plants. I left them a while before potting, indeed I thought they would have rotted in the meantime so when two started to grow I was pretty chuffed.

How will I be able to tell if the roots are okay or not?

[JayG]

How will I be able to tell if the roots are okay or not?

Unlikely to be OK, but as part of the post mortem empty the pot out onto a sheet of newspaper - you may find something like vine weevil grubs or other pests in the soil around the roots.

If the roots actually look healthy you could try re-potting it, but it looks too young to recover from the condition it's in now, especially as it's not a strawberry plant.

[mattwragg94]

what it looks like to me from the second pic is that the strawberry plant/crown is dead, and a weed has sprouted in its place - in the second pic you can clearly see the strawberry crown, but there im affraid its looks like there is not growth coming off of it  

[Trillium]

This is how strawberry leaves should look, regardless of what the store labelled them as. Not at all sure what you ended up with.

[zestymordant]

This is how strawberry leaves should look, regardless of what the store labelled them as. Not at all sure what you ended up with.

Yeah, you're right - as you know already! That's what the leaves look like in the lotty. Never made the connection though. In that case, never mind! It's a weed and I don't care if it dies

Cheers everybody