Thin Your Strawberry Plants

When you see a jungle in the strawberry patch you know it’s time to thin your strawberry plants. This can seem sad and a bit rough but in the end your strawberries will thank you. They need room to breathe and grow.

When to Thin your plants

Knowing when to thin your strawberry plants can sometimes be intimidating especially if you are a new strawberry patch owner. You don’t want to do something that will in turn ruin all your hard work and end up killing your precious plants. Strawberry plants are very tough once they get established. If you have already planted them and have a jungle to thin, then they are established.

Mowing the Plants

You have a couple different options when it comes to maintenance in the patch. One method is mowing them down. I have never personally done this so I cannot give my personal opinion on this one. If you decide to try this option, it is usually done in the fall when you are getting your beds all tucked in for winter. You will want to be sure to raise your mower to its highest setting, so you don’t take the plants past the crown or the base of the plant. You will remember at planting the importance of not placing the strawberry plant past its “crown” in the soil. Strawberry plants do not like staying wet and having the crown just on the surface will prevent them from drowning when a heavy rain hits. After mowing you can add composted manure and a layer of mulch to protect them during the freezing temperatures.

Getting Your Hands Dirty

The next method is simply thinning by hand and is what I have been doing with my patch. Spring is the ideal time to use this method when plants are just starting to wake up. Its easiest to rake away any mulch or remaining straw from last season. Don’t be afraid to be a little rough they will bounce back and thank you for the extra room to breathe.

When you have removed the old mulch, you can really see if the old plants have sent out runners, which they usually do. The runners have new plants attached at the ends and those are the plants they you will want to leave to bear fruit this year. Removing the old plants is optional but I do opt to remove any old ones they don’t look healthy before I move on to the new plants. You will be able to identify these old ones by looking at the base or the crown. You will see lots of old stems and runners from last year. These are the mother plants. I will remove the ones that look the worst and then move on to the new plants. Some of these new plants are barely in the soil. Removing these will leave the stronger plants and give them better air circulation and light.

Fertilizing

After thinning your plants in the spring, you will want to feed them. This year we purchased a load of composted manure from a local farmer. This manure has been sitting at their farm since last spring and is well composted and there is no chance of burning my plants. I sprinkled this around the ground and watered it in. In the past I have used a fish emulsion from Amazon and was very pleased with the results. I will apply this as well the beginning of May. Beware this is smelly! Strawberries are heavy feeders and love phosphorus and potassium and this fish emulsion is a great choice for them as well as your onions.

Thinning your strawberry plants will give you healthy plants that produce big, juicy berries. You may only need to do this garden chore every other year and that depends on the size of your patch and the age. You will be able to determine when this job needs tending to based on how thick your strawberry patch gets.

I hope you found something in this article useful and if so leave me a comment. Happy Planting!