redoing strawberry patch
My strawberries grew great but 2years later they are still producing small sad looking fruit and the weeds are terrible. The whole area has rather poor soil due to having a huge vegetable garden there for about 30years with little fertilizer and lots of mulch added. The person living here put cypress mulch around absolutely everything in thick layers and then just tilled the mulch in every year without adding anything else to the garden. I did add some compost before planting but apparently it wasn't nearly enough. Instead of trying to carefully mix bits of compost and peat in around the strawberries I've decided to tear it all up, pull all the strawberries out of the ground, and start over with more of a raised bed. I was going to dig down 6" in a 10'x20' rectangle, lay down a fabric barrier that let's some moisture through but not roots and weeds, stack timbers around it another 6" above ground level, and fill it all in with good quality soil. That way it will be 1' deep with 6" buried below ground level, alot less weeds, much better soil (I've got a whole truckload of composted horse manure waiting for spring), and my strawberries will be less likely to run off into my blueberry bushes. Will that winter the strawberries alright in zone 5 (up to -10 to -15F in the winter)? Is 1' of soil deep enough for large strawberry plants?