How to Care for Strawberries to Get the Most of Your Yields
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Have you ever heard that growing and caring for strawberries is a very difficult and completely unjustified process? That in order to grow it you need to sit in the beds all the time you have and spend a lot of money in order to grow a decent harvest? Well, let's find out if this is so and whether it is possible to enjoy the taste and good harvest of these beautiful berries without investing a lot of effort and money, and without having a lot of knowledge.
Preparing the soil after winter is over
If you've made the decision to plant strawberries in your garden, you need to know that they love fertile, nutrient-rich soils. Therefore, in the spring, apply fertilizers with many trace elements. Since these berries literally eat up all the magnesium, phosphorus and potassium from the soil, it is necessary to use fertilizers with a full range of trace elements and minerals.
As a rule, one package of complex fertilizer is enough for 400 liters of water. The mixture is prepared at the rate of one spoon per 10 liters and the soil under each bush is watered. When applying fertilizers purchased from a specialized store, follow the instructions for use.
Instead of a liquid mixture, you can add dry dressing. To do this, loosen the soil, add 15 grams of top dressing and cover with a thin layer of soil. After a few days, the granules will dissolve in the ground. If there is no rain in a couple of days after fertilization, then water the plants, this will help the potassium and magnesium to be better absorbed into the roots of the plant and saturate the soil.
In autumn, strawberry bushes are covered with straw mulch and therefore the plot looks sloppy in spring. Remove the mulch with a rake, cut off the frozen bushes and branches with garden shears, leaving only new ones. All grass must be burned, as it contains organisms that can provoke disease when it gets into the ground.
After winter, the ground becomes hard and poorly permeable to oxygen, so in the spring it is necessary to loosen it well with a rake or an ordinary stick. Oxygen is essential for good growth and development. Therefore, in addition to loosening, it is necessary to qualitatively weed the beds from weeds, as well as between the rows. Weeding will help dry the surface of the soil and roots of the weeds, which will further open up oxygen access to the strawberry bushes.
Propagation of strawberry bushes
The propagation of bushes should be started a month after the last frost. Reproduction takes place with the help of antennae, which form on the bushes in the first three weeks. Nitrogen contributes to their growth, so fertilizers containing nitrogen should be used as soon as the area is cleared of excess grass. When growing antennae, do not think about their quantity, their quality is important here. Sometimes even a small amount will give you a beautiful good bush after just one month. If the bushes develop quickly, they can bring the harvest this season. This applies to many varieties. With proper care, these bushes bloom within a month after planting.
After three months, when they gain strength, they will need care and it will not be difficult if the antennae of the plant grow in different directions, lying between the rows. If you did not plant the bushes in rows, then direct the antennae to free places.
It is necessary to plant the plants only after it is completely rooted and have a growth 2/3 less than an adult bush.As a rule, a couple of months after the appearance of the first tendril.
The growth of the plant, its development and the quality of the fruit depends entirely on how to care for the strawberry. This plant needs to be fed and watered on time, then you can enjoy a good harvest, which will appear on your table quickly enough.
When planting bushes, transplant new ones to that piece of land where strawberries did not live before. This will help protect plants from diseases and insects that may have remained there. In addition, soil that has not previously grown strawberries will have more nutrients.
How to care for transplanted strawberries
The site for planting new bushes must be chosen carefully and, if there is groundwater, the area being prepared must be raised to a height of 35 centimeters.
If there is no groundwater, then make an embankment of 15 centimeters so that the roots can receive more oxygen and are in conditions with minimal moisture. Stagnant water is very harmful to this plant, it can cause rot. It is imperative to apply fertilizer to a new site in order to saturate the earth with useful substances. For this, organic matter in the form of cow dung is very suitable. It must be introduced in advance, preferably six months before planting, so that it can be absorbed into the soil.
Strawberries prefer light, well-drained soil. If you have a lot of peat in the ground, then you will need to add 10 kilograms of sand and 6 kilograms of cow dung to a plot of 1 square meter.
If the soil is swampy, then you will need expanded clay or crushed stone in order to fill the site with them, and only after that fill the soil saturated with nutrients. If the soil has a high level of acidity, then it can be reduced with a 3% solution of slaked lime or 1 kilogram of chalk per sq. meter. In order to saturate the soil with the necessary minerals, nitrophoska is well suited.
When buying fertilizers in a specialized store or making them yourself, make sure that they do not contain chlorine, as it can provoke the death of the plant.
If you are using dolomite flour to calcium-saturate the soil, do so in the fall. Since a large amount of calcium negatively affects the metabolic processes in the plant.
Use a spray bottle to water the bushes, as watering directly onto the soil near the roots can create unnecessary tunnels. Spray generously until the ground puddles.
At the initial stage, in order for the bushes to take root well, watering should be done at least once every three days. Further, it will be enough to water once a week, if there was no rain. Make sure that the ground is always slightly damp, but without stagnant water.
How to care for strawberries after the first harvest
Strawberry is a plant that loves attention and care. This is especially important for her in the summer season. In order for us to get a good harvest and our bushes remain healthy, we must adhere to some rules about which we will tell.
After the harvest has been harvested, it is necessary to feed the plants in order to restore them the strength spent on the development of berries. After all, it is categorically impossible to carry out top dressing earlier, this makes strawberries toxic and, accordingly, harmful to us.
For feeding, you will need 20 grams of urea mixed with 10 liters of water. It will also be beneficial to apply a phosphate-based fertilizer.
Just remember that this applies exclusively to varieties that do not belong to remontant ones, since the latter bear fruit twice.
You should not add bushes with strawberries, as this will close the access of oxygen to it, and in case of hot weather, the roots will burn out.
Before the start of frost, the entire metabolism in the plant must end, otherwise the plants will die. Therefore, all fertilization activities must be completed before the beginning of August. For example, nitrogen-based fertilizers should only be applied in the spring when the plant needs to grow and gain green mass. Further, it will only be harmful to the plant.
Always, after harvesting, the soil must be well loosened. This will contribute to a good second harvest. In this case, the berries will be as large and mouth-watering as when they were first picked.
Diseases and pests: ways to control
Strawberry is a plant that not only requires attention, but is also very susceptible to various diseases and pests. We will tell you what infections and insects you can encounter and how to deal with them.
Gardeners who have an area with high humidity and in a region where it is cool are probably aware of such a disease as gray rot... Therefore, as a rule, they do not grow their bushes in the same place for more than 4 years in a row. This disease is very noticeable and even an uninformed person can easily identify it by brown spots on the berries and a gray bloom, after which the berries completely rot.
The only sure way to get rid of this disease is to immediately destroy diseased fruits, so that rot is not transmitted to healthy berries.
For prevention, it will be useful to treat the plants before flowering with copper sulfate, mixing 5 grams with 1 liter of water. And repeat the procedure after flowering.
Spotting- just as easy to diagnose. Bright green leaves begin to change color, turn white, brown, turn black, and then dry out and fall off. Due to this disease, the plant does not develop well, and the berries grow very small. Plants can be treated with chlorine at the rate of 3 grams per bucket of water or soapy water. This should be done after the leaves have opened and after the last harvest has been harvested.
Treatment with soapy water can be done more often and at any time, since it will not harm either the berries or humans.
Powdery mildewIs a stem disease. You can understand that you could not avoid this disease by the bronze-colored leaves and rotting berries. The berries begin to smell like mushrooms, but it's better not to taste the taste. The methods of control are spraying with the help of special chemicals that are sold in specialized stores. Plants can only be processed twice a season.
Strawberry leaves are very attractive strawberry mite... This insect severely damages the plant by stopping photosynthesis, which affects the correct metabolism. Unfortunately, to understand that an insect attacked the bushes, the damage is often similar to the symptoms of spotting. Dark dots appear on the leaves. Shades of yellow in the damaged area will help you navigate. Perhaps the best way to combat a pest is a solution of 12 grams of karbofos and 10 liters of water at a temperature of at least thirty degrees. After preparing the solution, spray the plant well.
And finally, everyone is familiar snails and slugs... Fortunately, they do not like strawberries too much, although in some parts of our country they exist in huge quantities and it is very difficult to get rid of them.
Mataldehyde is suitable for controlling these pests. For 1 sq. meter will need 20 grams of this substance, which should be diluted with water at the rate of 1 to 25. If you have a lot of these mollusks, then 1 to 20.
Plants should be treated with this solution 4 times a season, but only once every 14 days. Processing should not be done less than three weeks before harvest, so that harmful substances can be removed from the berries.
Prevention is very helpful. If you properly care for the strawberries and take care of the plant in advance, process it on time, then its development and your harvest will surely please you.
Do not forget that stagnant water in the soil provokes diseases and attracts pests. Do not water, but spray your bushes.