Strawberries

There's no doubt about it, you absolutely cannot beat the taste of one of our homegrown strawberries!

As our first fruit crop of the year, strawberries bear fruit in late spring to early summer depending on the weather. Each strawberry plant can produce strawberries for two years. 

We plant strawberries every year and rotate patches to keep from depleting the nutrients in the soil.

We plant plugs(seedlings) and bare root strawberries(simply a plug without any soil attached). Plugs are planted in the late summer and bare roots are planted in late summer to early fall. Strawberries are planted on plastic mulch beds to control weeds and maintain soil moisture.

By the spring the strawberry plants will be producing.

We pull all weeds by hand to make sure that each plant has the best chance of a significant crop.

Plants will produce a blossom. 1 strawberry will emerge from each blossom in about 4-6 weeks.

Once the plant begins to fruit, it will produce berries for about 1 month.

In the height of the season each strawberry plant can produce as many as 10-12 berries per plant.

 

To pick strawberries, we first select the perfect berry. The perfect berry is one that is deep red in color without any green spots.

Then we pinch off the berry at the base of the stem closes to the berry. Pulling the berry itself can damage the berry and the strawberry plant. We fill quarts and leave them in the rows and come and collect them after picking is complete. 

 

 

 

Weather can play a large factor in the development and yield of a strawberry crop. Extremely wet can encourage diseases like molding and pests such as slugs which can completely devastate a years crop.  Frost can destroy the blossoms and in turn the entire strawberry. If we do expect frost, we set up and turn on our sprinkler systems so that the water will continuously run over the plant so that the plant itself cannot freeze. The water will create a barrier and insulate the plant.

We specifically select the best tasting, shape, and quality varieties for planting. We grow the Everbearing variety which means that the variety can produce a berry in the fall as well as spring.

However, if we decided to pick the fall berries the next spring would yield significantly smaller berries. Instead of picking them in the fall, we mow off the berries to stop them from from fruiting and encourage large berry growth in the coming spring.

Before the first frost we cover the strawberry plants with a generous layer of straw to keep the plants warm throughout the cold winter months. 

In the spring or after the last frost, we uncover the plants and allow them to breath in the warmer spring air and soak up sun in order to produce another round of yummy berries.

After the second year, we then remove the plastic and plow under the plants, disk and replace the field with another crop of a different vegetable.

Never wash your berries and put them in the fridge. Only wash them right before you are ready to eat them. Once the strawberries are picked they should be enjoyed within 2-3 days. I am sure that won't be a problem!

Not only do we offer strawberries in your CSA shares but we also do pick your own every spring at our Greenhouse location at 8 Route 24 in Chester, NJ. There is no charge to enter the field and strawberries are $3.29/lb.

Strawberries, by far, are one of our favorite crops to grow!