Kimberly or honey strawberries? The choice is yours

Garden strawberries are a tasty and aromatic berry crop, popular among summer residents. It is unpretentious, endures winter safely, grows almost everywhere, from the Arctic Circle to the equator, and produces a good harvest. Appetizing strawberries lift your spirits and improve digestion. Its various varieties are adapted to different soils. To get a rich harvest, you need to choose the right place for planting it, choose a good variety and properly care for it.

Content:

• Determining a landing site
• Which variety should I choose?
• Selection and purchase of seedlings
• Planting and care

Determining a place to plant strawberries

For planting strawberries you need to choose the right piece of land. It is better to choose well-moistened, light soil, without excess calcium. The area should be flat, protected from the wind, without stagnant water. The ideal option for watering strawberries is drip irrigation.

It is also worth considering the use of black mulching film; it will help avoid constant work on removing weeds, rotting berries, and contaminating them with soil.

Which variety should I choose?

The choice of variety is based on the preferences of the gardener. If you want to try strawberries as early as possible, then you should consider planting early varieties, for example: Kimberly strawberries, Honey, Elvira, Vita Zanta. There are also medium varieties (Alexandrina, Carmen) and mid-late varieties of strawberries (Alpha, Gigantella).

Many of our gardeners choose remontant strawberries, that is, those that produce several harvests per year, for example: Queen Elizabeth, Mount Everest, Fresco, etc.

The advantage of early varieties of strawberries is that they are winter-hardy and resistant to various diseases. For example: Dutch Kimberley strawberries are resistant to powdery mildew, winter-hardy, ripen early and have sweet, fragrant, large fruits. Early strawberry Elvira is resistant to fungi and grows well in cold, damp areas.

If the site allows, it is good to combine strawberry varieties. Then you can enjoy strawberries all year round, admiring their rich taste. But all aspects of growing a particular variety should be taken into account, because under exactly the same conditions they will produce different yields, depending on whether care and feeding are suitable for them.

Those varieties that produce high yields and are recognized as the most delicious are very popular, for example: Albion, Elizabeth II (remontant), Honey, Kimberly (early), Zenga-Zengana (late).

Selection and purchase of seedlings

Now you need to find good seedlings. On the market they may sell another variety instead of what was promised. In addition, strawberries have many different diseases and pests (mites, nematodes). They are transmitted with planting material. It is difficult for a gardener to distinguish between healthy, developed plants and diseased ones. Therefore, it is better to purchase seedlings from a nursery.

Experienced sellers there can help in choosing and will give the correct answer to any buyer question. It is recommended to buy seedlings in pots or cassettes. It's a little more expensive, but it's worth it.

Frigo seedlings packed in peat have proven themselves well. It is high quality and easy to install.These seedlings are without leaves, preserved all winter using a special technology in the cold. You just need to check if it has sprouted too much. If the central leaf is small and green, then you can safely purchase it and plant it either in a greenhouse or in a pot on the windowsill.

Planting and care

The size of the bed is made arbitrary, convenient for care. But the most suitable planting pattern is 60x60 cm.

It is not recommended to plant strawberries after garden crops or over strawberries. If the soil is fresh, then feel free to plant any variety.

If the soil is not fertile enough, it is necessary to add compost or high-moor peat and mineral fertilizers that do not contain chlorine. The soil should be carefully dug up and a bed should be formed. You can plant in 1-2 weeks.

As already mentioned, you can cover the bed with non-woven black material. The seedlings are planted in slits in the fabric.

Seedlings grown in a greenhouse must be given the opportunity to adapt to the balcony or street. Otherwise she may die.

It is better to plant seedlings in April-May. In this case, remontant varieties will produce their first harvest before autumn. Regular varieties can also produce flowers, but it is better to pick them off. Almost all summer you can plant new strawberry bushes, until mid-autumn.

If the plant is planted from a pot, the earth should be slightly disturbed when planting so that the roots can quickly grow into the ground.

After planting, the plants should be watered well. In cool weather, you can close the beds. For this, a frame and non-woven material are used. Be sure to water and open the beds once a week. The cover should be removed before flowering.

When the harvest appears, the berries are collected every other day or daily.If remontant or late strawberries are planted, there will be berries until mid-autumn. Therefore, when it gets colder, it is again recommended to make a shelter.

Strawberries winter well with ample snow cover. But if the winter is cold and there is little snow, it may die. Therefore, it is advisable to cover the plants for the winter.

Undoubtedly, strawberry is the queen of all berries. The article lists its most worthy varieties. It is advisable to try to grow all of them and only then can you accurately determine what kind of berry it is. We hope that recommendations on choosing a variety and caring for strawberries will help novice gardeners make the right choice and get a high yield.