I have a file from the extension office for Houston County I can send it to you if you give me your email address. if this link doesnt work. (sorry I dont know how to make it a live link so you'll have to cut and paste) http://pubs.caes.uga.edu/caespubs/pubcd/C883.htm 12. Twelve Recommended Varieties of Strawberries for Southern States: Choosing the best variety of strawberry plants is vital to accomplishment in container growing strawberries. Basically, it boils down to one simple rule - select the strawberry variety that grows best in your state (and the region of your state). You can get a great deal of information online in understanding these choices of strawberries. Make sure you choose warm climate varieties. The following are my recommendations, for consideration in growing strawberries in most Southern states: Aromas- Ever bearer; fast fruiting strawberries; resistant to powdery mildew and spider mites; large strawberry fruit; has some pollination issues; upright plant. Â Camarosa - Spring bearer; large long wedge fruit; deep red color; variations in sweetness and taste. Â Capitola - Ever bearer; high yield fruit. Â Chandler - Spring bearer; medium to large fruit; dessert strawberry. Â Diamante - Ever bearer; large fruit; resistant to powdery mildew and spider mites. Â Gaviota - Spring bearer; large fruit; can be seedy in hot weather. Â Oso Grande - Spring bearer; medium sized fruit with unique rounded tip; flavor and color varies. Â Rosa Linda - Ever bearer; medium sized firm and nice-looking fruit; may have white tips when ripe; good flavor. Â Seascape - Spring bearer; large well-shaped fruit; disease resistant; ever bearing; very good container strawberry. Â Selva - Ever bearer; fast fruiting deep red and firm strawberry fruit; variations in shapes; dry and bland flavor. Â Sweet Charlie - Spring bearer; medium to large fruit that varies in color from orange red to bright red; very sweet; resistant to fruit rot. Â Winter Dawn - Spring bearer; prolific runners. PLANTING STRAWBERRIES, GROWING STRAWBERRIES AND HARVESTING STRAWBERRIES Soil Preparation Strawberries require a loose, loamy, slightly acidic soil (pH 6.0-6.5) (Test your soil for pH, and then amend it if needed to raise its acidity level) and full sun to achieve peak berry quality, but they will tolerate a variety of soil conditions as long as they have adequate drainage Soil that is high in organic matter is absolutely necessary. Prepare your strawberry beds by turning under 1/2"-1" high quality, animal manure or plant residue-based compost. Compost composed of cedar or redwood is not an acceptable substitute for high quality compost. Also it is a great idea to lay mulching film on the soil as it greatly reduces the need for weeding. Hanging Strawberry Baskets Suspending strawberries off the ground is a great way to keep slugs, snails, and sow bugs off them. Five to six strawberry plants can grow in the top of a hanging basket in the spring. But if you want to make the ultimate hanging strawberry basket, gather 24 strawberry plants, a 16 inch wire basket, potting soil, and some sphagnum moss, coconut fiber or a specially designed basket liner. Line the wire basket with the damp sphagnum moss, coconut fiber or basket liner. Insert 18 of the plants into the basket sides through the sphagnum moss. After you have finished, fill the basket with potting soil and planting the remaining plants in the top of the basket. The basket will continue to produce fruit for about three years. Strawberry Pots Strawberry pots are designed to hold one to three plants at the top. The pockets in the sides would then be able to hold any runners that developed as the plant matured. However, many gardeners fill all the openings with strawberry right from the start. To plant your own strawberry pot, you will need a piece of PVC pipe that is capped at one end, a drill, potting soil, and a strawberry pot. Cut the pipe so that it will fit inside the strawberry pot with the uncapped end even with the pot's rim. Drill 1/8" diameter holes an inch apart down alternating sides of the pipe. In other words, on one side your first hole might be 1/2" inch from the top, but on the other side your first hole would be one inch from the top. Partially fill with the pot with soil and insert the tube, capped end down, into the center of the pot. Loosely add the rest of the potting mix. Plant each pocket. Add more soil around the roots if needed. Finish by planting two to three plants at the top and soaking the soil well. Water the pot by inserting a funnel into the pipe and pour water into it, ensuring that the water is distributed evenly through the pot. Instructions for Growing Strawberries in Containers: 1. Choosing Containers - Proper drainage is very important for strawberry plants to grow and produce plenty of fruit. You can either plant them in hanging containers or raise the containers to allow drainage. Any type of clay planter pots that have drainage holes in the bottom and "saucers" to keep the soil from washing away, will work just fine; pick a size that fits the area you intend to grow your strawberries and how many containers you have. You can also use large cans by hammer by punching or drilling several large holes in the bottom with some screen over the holes to prevent soil from washing out through them. Most nurseries and garden centers also sell special strawberry pots which have pockets up and down both sides. If you use the strawberry pots, be sure to fill each one to the lowest pocket with soil. If you use cans, fill them so you have about one-and-a-half inches of the rim still showing. Sunlight is very critical, so be sure you pick a spot that gets between six and eight hours of sunlight per day for best results. 2. Selecting Strawberry Plants - The two main types of strawberry plants are ever-bearing and seasonal. Either type will work fine for container growing, but if you live in a colder climate then the ever-bearing type may not survive the winter months, so seasonal producing strawberry plants may be your best bet. Ask your local nursery or garden center which variety is recommended for your local climate conditions. 3. Preparing Soil for Strawberry Plants - Strawberries like soil that is "loamy", with lots organic material they can consume. Add either 5-10-5 fertilizer or 21-0-0 ammonium sulfate to your soil before planting strawberries. Again, ask your local nursery what type of fertilizer they recommend for your local soil conditions or what type of potting soil they suggest for growing strawberries. 4. Planting Your Strawberries - After filling each container with the amended soil, plant your strawberry plants so the roots are covered. Unless you have very large containers, place only one plant in each container; strawberry plants should be about two feet apart from each other so that they get plenty of sunlight. 5. Watering Container-grown Strawberries - DonÂt over water your container strawberries; they should be watered enough to keep the soil damp but not so much that you have any standing water. You should water the plants whenever the top of the soil begins to look dry on the top half inch or so. Again; itÂs important to be sure your containers are able to drain adequately without the soil being washed away! 6. Fertilizing Container-grown Strawberries - Throughout the summer months, fertilize your plants every other week with a high phosphorus liquid fertilizer to encourage them to flower. Container Strawberry Growing Tips: Â In the spring, strawberries are typically the first fruit to ripen. Â Place your strawberry containers in a sunny area and turn them 180 degrees twice a week to keep the plants exposed evenly to sunlight. Â While ever-bearing strawberry plants grow throughout the year, they will produce two crops a year; in June and late summer. These berries will be smaller than classic strawberry varieties. Â If you plant a "day-neutral" variety of strawberry, you will get a modest crop of fruit throughout most of the summer months except when the weather is very hot. Â Alpine strawberries, also called "fraises des bois", will produce small, but tasty fruit all summer, but you need a lot of strawberry plants to produce any real quantity of berries, so they are not the best for container-growing. Â If you plant ever-bearing strawberries, you should pinch off the blossoms until midsummer of the first season and then let them flower naturally after that; you should get an early fall crop the first year and then two crops a year afterward. Â Let the fruit ripen on the plant, picking your strawberries when they are red and juicy; enjoy!

Thanks for the recommendations Stew, I'll be looking out for those varieties for the next time I buy, especially madame moutot. I have thousands of alpine strawberries lining my paths here and growing wherever they can, it not only pretties up the place but my daughter spends ages clearing a patch of berries then looking under the leaves for any she missed, there's always another patch of them she never found too ready for her next hunt. I'm thinking about how I can get them to bear more fruit at the moment, if there's a heavy bearing strain I can introduce and I think all mine are cloned from one plant. Apart from those I grow mostly cambridge favorite so I can see why you like them. To extend the season I'm trying calypso and judibell this year. So far I've only had 1 small calypso berry to try from these but it had a good flavour too. Hey, if you want to test out the variation in taste I'd be happy to grow more varieties here and send you some fruit. You can email me through GardenWeb if you want to do something like this, only too happy to oblige. :)

Rick: What is your strategy for dealing with weeds? I would give that some thought before expanding your patch to four 40' rows. Keeping the plants thinned to 8-10 inches apart is easy, but the weeds can be nearly impossible. I will try to respond to your specific questions, but keep in mind that all these issues are insignificant in a strawberry planting when compared with weeds. 1. Runners may be transplanted any time from late fall, right through winter and into spring. 2. The ground never really freezes in N. Virginia. That is why no insulating mulch is required in winter. If left around the plants in spring, mulch can harbor hatcheries for slugs, pillbugs, and the black strawberry-eating beetle. In most N. Virginia locations, strawberry plants remain green throughout the entire winter. Deer eat them, often pulling them out by the roots. You can reduce deer damage by covering the patch with the cheap, black plastic fencing material sold at bigbox stores, but it must be pinned down or the deer will simply move it out of the way. 3. You can place your runners wherever you like, maintaining a rough distance of 8-10 inches between the plants. Any closer than that and they will start to crowd, sunlight to the berries will be reduced, berry size will decrease, and fungal problems like gray mold will increase. If a runner has rooted in an acceptable location, leave it where it is. 4. If you planted bareroot, bundled plants only this past March, they are still young and should be good for another year. I am a little surprised that you harvested an acceptable crop from spring planted berries. That testifies to the vigor and productivity of the Jewel variety. When I renew a strawberry patch, I remove all plants two years or older in favor of vigorous new runners. Older plants will have longer crowns and are easy to identify. Berry size and productivity fall off rapidly with older plants. After years of fighting weeds in my strawberry plantings, both annual and perennial, deep-rooted types that are nearly impossible to remove, I planted my most recent patch on 10' wide, 6 mil. black plastic from Lowes. Sometimes they have 6 mil. plastic that is 20' wide. That would be even better for a wider patch. The plastic was one of the better ideas I have had. I just cut an "X" in the plastic for each plant; when runners formed I cut slits and made sure the new crown of leaves was in contact with the soil so it could root. Of course you can't root all the runners from a vigorous variety like Jewel; maybe only 20% or less. Toss out the rest. Worked great. There is some hand labor involved, but nothing like what you will soon face from weeds in a patch as large as you contemplate. A few weeds will still grow around the cuts in the plastic, but nothing like you will see if you leave the area open. If you feel like trying another variety, that's up to you. Delmarvel is good, from the same development program as Jewel. So is Honeoye. But you will find it hard to improve on the productivity and quality of Jewel, although like most of the berries grown around here it is a little tart and requires some sugar to bring out the strawberry taste. Don Yellman, Great Falls, VA

>> cut them off if you dont need the extra plants The current 2 dozen plants have already passed the flowering stage, and combined they produced enough strawberries to fill a tablespoon. These plants aren't going to product any more strawberries from what I understand of strawberry plants. So I'm stuck with un-fruitful plants with runners. I thought that the runners were my quickest route to producing new fruit, therefore my reluctance to cut them and throw them away.