While joellenh does appear to actually be a real person sharing her glee at great finds, message boards such as these can quickly get taken over and ruined by spammers posing as such. That's why many boards have a zero tolerance policy about posting things like that: because it's impossible to tell if someone is sincerely sharing a great find or if it's a bot plastering ads. While I haven't been on GW much since it was taken over by iVillage, here are some solutions I've seen people take in the past: 1) Have a dedicated thread(s) for posting links to great deals. 2) The sharer doesn't post a link or a lot of details, instead they post something like, "I found a great deal on Strawberry beds. If anyone is interested I'll post details." 3) The sharer posts it in a discussion after making several other posts engaging in conversation for awhile. 4) The sharer has a long history on the forum and is already known to it's members. I hope this helps y'all settle this amicably. -EC

Hello! I bought some bare root strawberries maybe 3 weeks ago? from Wal*Mart. I was wondering how to store mine as I have at least a month before I can put them in the ground. At first, I put them in my basement where it's cool and dark. After a week or so, I started to get concerned about them. I didn't want them to die!! After much thought and looking online, this is what I did back around March 22nd. I first soaked a bundle of 10 roots (the entire bunch that was in the bag) for maybe a minute. After some soaking you can see the 2 rubber bands that need to be cut to free the roots. Then I separated each root and laid them on some folded newspaper, making sure the crowns were a little ABOVE the top of the paper. I then folded up the bottom part of the paper to cover all the roots and then rolled the roots together and secured the whole business with 2 rubber bands. I put them in a container and watered them completely. I keep them in a sunny spot in my bedroom. I take them outside wheneve it's sunny and warm. I keep the newspaper wet at all times; never let it dry out! I don't let them sit in water though. I give them liquid fertilizer once a week. Here is a picture of them 2 weeks later: I did purchase more strawberry plants because I noticed some were not greening up like the others ones did. From my exerience, the best plants were the ones where life was visible. The heavies, wettest packages were not the best ones....the best ones were the bags with whitish/green stems/leaves visible. HTH :o) Catherine

There are a number of vertical strawberry planters available, but keeping the soil in them and the strawberries watered is a challenge, especially here in SoCal. I've used the conventional strawberry pots, and if there is any die back with the plants, a hole develops and the soil washes out. Also, the planters need to be turned regularly so the plants in the back get enough sun. A plastic pipe with holes positioned down the middle of the pot is necessary to get the water deep down inside the pot. The Growin' Bags from Parks are perhaps the most affordable containers, hold up well, can hang anywhere, but they dry out fast here in SoCal, and need to be watered twice a day in the hottest weather. A quick once over with the hose isn't enough to soak the whole bag. Only one third to one half of my original strawberry plants are still alive in them. Soil seems to be critical in these containers, something that retains moisture, but drains easily. Adding water polymers to the potting soil seems to help. Coco Coir might help also. The easiest way to grow them, for me, is still the regular raised bed with potting soil. The plants can be crowded a bit, especially the alpines, are easy to water, weed, fertilize. A strip border bed that runs along the front of a regular bed, say around 2-3 feet deep, and as long as the regular bed, still allows you to reach over the strawberries to weed the main bed, and is easy to squeeze into an area with limited space. The raised part settles down over a few years, so when there are runners, they're easy to tuck back into the main bed, root, and keep the bed going, not take over the yard. Here is a link that might be useful: Growin' Bags

The crown of your little plant looks surprisingly good to me! I know you don't want to, but cut off the little berries! The plant doesn't need the extra stress of trying to produce fruit while it's trying to recover. If it/they produce any more flowers, for now pinch them off. Continue to leave the soil dry until it's mostly dry down to the bottom of wherever the roots were when you planted them in the bigger pot. Then I would normally recommend saturating the soil in the entire pot, but in this case where there are small (and recovering) plants in a large volume of soil I recommend watering just enough to re-wet the soil to about that "bottom of the roots" area. With no roots in it the soil in the bottom of the pot is going to stay pretty wet even without more water--and some of the water you apply to the surface is going to get down all the way to the bottom anyway. Basically what I'm trying to say is to get the soil "moist" in the entire area of the roots--but don't get it "drippy!" I also recommend moving the pot to get it some morning and/or late afternoon sun but try to keep it out of the hottest midday sun until it's growing well again. From what I can see the soil in your pic "looks" pretty good, but it's impossible to tell without getting my hands in it! I've never heard of that brand, and that seems like a pretty "complicated" list of ingredients to me! Just my opinion! Since their site says: "This is not the product label. Always read and follow the product label before use" I searched their site for the product label and couldn't find it! That's interesting! I googled for it and couldn't find it anywhere on the web! Usually I can find labels posted on "some" site, even if the manufacturer doesn't want to post it for whatever reason, but not this time! Don't know what, if anything, that says! But, how big IS your pot? I suspect a good "container mix" ("lightweight and fluffy" when moist) would probably work better for you and make it easier for you to manage the moisture content. And a good container mix/soil should have everything in it you need so you shouldn't need to add any manure or anything else--just feed occasionally after the plant starts growing. A "raised bed" would normally be measured in feet by feet, and I suspect your pot isn't even 24" diameter (my whiskey barrels are only 22" diameter). A "topsoil" based product would work fine in a raised bed with a much larger volume, but the smaller volume in a pot, even a big one, would make it harder to control the moisture with that type of mix. [I use Sunshine #1 mix in and for everything! My biggest "pots" are the whisky barrels and I use it in them and for everything all the way down to seed starting. Sunshine #1 consists of mostly Canadian sphagnum peat and perlite.] Looking at your "little plant" I really think it's gonna make it if you leave it dry out enough and then water very "judiciously" for a while! :-) Show us some pics when it's Growing For Real! Skybird P.S. Glad to hear you don't use MG! Unless they've changed something in the last couple years, they don't even list on the bag what they put in it--just something to the effect of "might contain any or all for the following"!!!