[jacnal]

Good morning gardeners!

More questions from me, I'm afraid..... Please bear with me!

I've been very fortunate in that I found LOADS of strawberries on my allotment plot, and we've been thoroughly enjoying them - best ever strawbs, even though I didn't grow them,  , which makes me want to look after them even more.

Well, I've seen people mulch with straw, and I've taken as much weed as possible from the surface and mulched with non straw mulch (the regular organic stuff). Is the straw better just for keeping the berries off the ground, or does it do more? And, can I pick any straw, for example from the pet shop downstairs, provided it's not covered in chemicals, or do I need special strawberry straw?? In which case, where do I find some? Didn't see any at Wyevale yesterday, and I looked  .  Am I even making sense,    :?:

One last query..... the plants are forming runners, and I read somewhere that you could place vigorous plants' runners over a pot of compost to establish for next year. How can I tell vigorous plants? They're all pretty much quite healthy. Oh, and how do I prune for even more fruiting> Many stalks forming all over the place, they look like spiders!

[richyrich7]

Any straw will do IMHO. be much cheaper to buy a bale from a farmer if you can about £2.50 around here.

The straw tends to keep the fruit raised off the soil a little away from pests,keeping them cleaner to and used to be burnt off at the end of each year I believe.

 Most runners will be vigorous but try to take them from a parent plant that is healthy, disease free and prolific with it's fruiting, as the runner will be an exact genetic replica of mum.

Some people remove all the runners for 2 years to make the plants fruit more and then in the third year take new plants from the runners and replace the older ones the following year with the younger more vigorous plants.

Strawberry plants tend to fruit less after the first 3 years.

Hope this helps