A bare root is exactly what it sounds like. Your plant will arrive with its roots bare and won’t be in compost. This is a common way that strawberry plants are sold.
I bought a few varieties off Amazon and will show you how I planted them. You can also grow strawberries from seed, but they take quite a while to establish themselves properly.
Savour the flavour of your own homegrown strawberries, picked straight from your patio. These 3 varieties have been specially selected for an extended cropping period so that you can keep harvesting a constant supply of delicious sweet, juicy fruits over a much longer period.
This is how bare-root strawberries arrive, and it can be pretty shocking if you are not expecting it. All you get is a bunch of roots with a tiny bit of green growth at the top.
They will often be covered in soil and looking pretty sorry for themselves. You may think they will not grow, but trust me; they bounce back quickly.
When your bare-root strawberries arrive, the first thing to do is to get them out of the packing quickly and start rehydrating. You want to do this as soon as they arrive. If you leave them for any length of time, there is a good chance they will die.
I give mine a good soak in the sink for an hour or two before planting them up.
Planting in containers or baskets
This is a crucial step in planting up your strawberries if you are going to plant in containers or baskets, if you are planting into the ground then you can skip this step. I like to use high-quality compost, mixed with vermiculite to increase water retention and, finally, some 6X chicken manure to enrich the mix.
I then get stuck in and mix this well with my hands. Vermiculite is added to help water retention; it is super absorbent and soaks up water before slowly releasing it over time. This means you don’t have to water your baskets/containers as often.
Planting Strawberries
There is really only one thing you need to be mindful of when planting strawberries and that is that you don’t bury the crown below the soil.
The crown is the centre part of the plant where the leaves grow from. If this ends up under the soil then it can rot and the plant will die.
Keep your plants 20-30cm apart and water them well once they are planted.
That is all there is to it. Let me know in the comments below if you have any questions or tips.
Good luck in the garden,
Daniel