Strawberry plants after harvest. How to care for them?

It would be a great pity to neglect strawberry plants after fruiting. On the contrary, after harvest they need your care. And this applies to both the plant and the soil. It is high time to treat the beds from which you have recently harvested sweet and juicy fruit. Avoid unnecessary mistakes so that you can enjoy a rich strawberry harvest again next year!

At this time, the strawberry crop is usually in, to put it mildly, an undesirable condition, with weeds present in the compacted soil (nettles, dandelions, chamomile, thistle, etc.) and in the rows between you may notice runners spreading and forming new plants. It is best to remove weeds by hand and lightly hoe the strawberry plants. For larger areas, spraying can then be applied. Cutting runners off the strawberry plants effectively prevents the clumps from weakening, and the cut runners can also be used to prepare new planting material. 

Strawberries also spread readily on their own. That is why, when renewing strawberry beds after harvest, you may also come across completely new seedlings. The closer they are to the original (mother) plant, the greater their potential. You can transplant such plants into a pot or window box and keep them for autumn.

You will achieve the best yields with two-year-old strawberry plants. For three-year-old crops, already expect that very few strawberry stands remain healthy. Strawberry plants of this age are usually already affected by diseases or pests, and next year new planting material will bring you much greater benefit and pleasure.

Cutting the leaves across the whole area stops assimilation

Many growers then make the mistake of cutting back strawberry leaves across the whole area. The fact that the strawberry plants in your bed have already fulfilled their purpose for the season and finished fruiting does not mean that these plants no longer need to assimilate. And it is precisely by cutting the leaves across the whole area that you prevent further uptake and conversion of substances by the plant, which then remains significantly weakened. So how should you correctly remove leaves from strawberry plants?

It takes patience and it is best to cut off only unhealthy or damaged leaves one by one. High-quality garden shears will make the job easier.

Do not be misled by the fact that large-scale growers, and following their example many gardeners as well, remove leaves after harvest by simply mowing the crop, and if they do not damage the crowns of the plants, the strawberry plants will have plenty of new leaves by winter. This does not apply to everbearing varieties, and by winter they will not have had time to renew their leaves. For this reason, they would then be at risk from frost. It is not worthwhile to mow young crops across the whole area either.

Suitable fertilisation after strawberry harvest and the importance of watering

The strawberry plants have already used all their energy and available nutrients to produce flowers, and especially fruit. To fertilise such exhausted strawberry beds after harvest, you can use both special fertilisers for strawberries and basic plant nutrition with a balanced ratio of nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium (see separate article: NPK – what is it?). The advantage is that high-quality fertilisers for strawberries are also produced in the Czech Republic. Here is the proof:

• Jungle GARDEN G4 – strawberries (in the picture) together with the BASE component. We also recommend the separate article: Jungle Indabox maximises the advantages of chelate binding.
• AgroBio TRUMF is suitable if you prefer purely organic fertiliser for strawberries, as well as other small fruit crops.

The world-famous brand Terra Aquatica produces the fertiliser PermaBloom, which you can use not only for strawberries, but also for all other common crops that produce repeatedly.

Strawberry plants belong among plants that usually root relatively shallowly and we cannot count on them having a very branched root system. Sufficient watering after harvest is therefore very important so that a lack of moisture in the winter months does not cause the plants to die. Before the onset of winter, every strawberry plant that has finished fruiting needs to be supplied with both water and nutrients.

From September onwards, avoid a higher content of nitrogen and magnesium in strawberry nutrition.

Later comes the winter protection of strawberry plants. This will also decide what kind of harvest you can look forward to a year later. Crops planted in autumn can be covered for winter with conifer branches. Bear in mind that everbearing varieties will be more susceptible to frost. Non-woven fabric helps in the fight against severe frosts. non-woven fabric.

Regularly renew strawberry beds

Simply put, the soil in a strawberry bed needs to be loosened and fertilised after harvest.

When it comes to renewing strawberry beds, it is worth relying on the proven ¼ area rule. This means that every year we renew at least a quarter of the bed, where we prepare exactly the kind of soil that suits strawberry plants best and in which they are able to resume growth most quickly after winter, namely light, airy and slightly acidic soil. Light soil also warms up more easily. A Previous article Next article