I've been prepping a new strawberry bed out of virgin clay soil, deep dug with lots of compost. Unfortunately I didn't get the berries into the freshly dug crumbly soil before the spring rains turned it into goo. The problem is that my flat of strawberry plants has been sitting around so long that a lot of berries are forming. I have the following choices.
1) Put the plants into the goo just to get them in the ground.
2) Keep babying them in the flat (18x3" pots), harvest the ripe berries and then plant them later in the season when the soil has dried and been reworked.
I think that if I do #1 the soil texture will be forever 'cloddy', and the plants will suffer long term and possibly short term as well.
If I do #2 I will get to eat my berries, and have huge plants, but I do not know if rooting will be a problem if I put them out after the berries ripen (probably June). Will they just sit there in the ground sulking and put out lots of runners or will they root well and be strong mother plants for next year? When are they to big to plant?
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hendi_alex
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My response would be to step the plants up to one gallon nursery pots which can be done with barely a disturbance. Let the fruit mature, and then move the plants to the ground in a month or so or even wait until the fall to move them into the bed. You could even set the pots on the bed and when runners form, they will take root directly in the bedding soil.
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The Helpful Gardener
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