Strawberry secrets

 Well, this was my first experience with growing strawberries.

I purchased 10 small strawberry plants last year. Great was my excitement when I found a handful of strawberries on the plants. I saved the runners and planted them in little pots in September. Runners are vine-like extensions that shoot out of the plants and grow some leaves as well as some roots.

Once the runners were well established in the pots, it was time to plant them outdoors.

I made a hill of about a foot tall and planted the runners about 12 to 15 inches apart. Once planted, I covered the entire hill with hay, and this has definitely kept the weeds down.

I also planted some runners inside a stack of two tires plus I made a raised bed out of Styrofoam boxes. At that point, the runners had gotten pretty big.

This is what it looked like:

After my strawberry beds had been set up, fall and winter came and the gardens took a long, cold nap. Would the strawberry plants survive the bitter cold? Would the snow flatten them?
Once spring came and the snow melted away, I was happy to see the strawberry plants come to life.
Fast-forward a few months, and June has been beyond generous. With still numerous strawberries to pick, I have already frozen 10 quarts.

The strawberries are big and oh so sweet.

Four quarts in the sink, just from today's harvest.

I didn't even use half of the runners. I am convinced that you can start a strawberry farm with just 10 plants. If I saved all the runners from this year, I'd literally have hundreds of plants.