Strawberry producing dried fruit/flowers dry out

[Katten]

Meet my strawberry. I started it from seed in February, and it seems to be getting along well with the other plants. It lives in the container on the windowsill, and gets a lot of sun, but not too much to handle as it is as we live as close to the north pole as one can get on the mainland.

Now I wasn't actually expecting any fruit the first year, but when the flowers arrived I became a bit anxious for it anyways. The flowers look perfect, but when the point comes for them to turn into berries they dry out and fall off. I tried hand pollinating them, and it didn't really work. Some of the flowers turned into zombie-like versions of strawberries, mutant like, small and shriveled.

What I'd like to know is if this is expected of strawberries the first year, and if there is something I can do to make them happier. It looks pretty happy from the distance, and is producing a lot of leaves, including new growth.

I took these pictures with my mobile phone, but if you guys need better quality I can take more with a real camera.

I am new to this forum, but will probably come by with more questions as I love experimenting with seeds and watching miracles happen as plants grow, grow, grow!

[applestar]

They do need to be hand-pollinated if indoors without access for pollinating insects. How did you try to do it? I'm pretty sure I was using a soft watercolor brush when I was growing my strawberries (alpine) in the garage this winter. It also seems to help to buzz them with electric toothbrush before touching the flowers with the brush. (Tomatoes and peppers definitely release pollen when buzzed so I thought strawberries might, too)

Your plant looks pale to me. When was the last time you fertilized? Use fruiting fertilizer -- I mostly used tomato-tone but also fertilized with citrus/fruit tree fertilizer.

When blooming and setting fruits/fruiting, mine was extra thirsty and needed lots of water.

[ACW]

I would give it a bigger pot and lots more water once the flower form.
Just been removing some 4year old plants From the garden and their roots were 6 incjes long and well spread .
Regular watering and more than I normally do has resulted in a very good crop from limited space

[JONA]

One other point ...while your plant is building up its strength and increasing its crown area......that's the central point the leaves are growing from.....don't let your plant produce runners. Cut them off as they start to grow.
They can make a big demand on your plant.
Plants have only one aim in life , to propagate.
If this can be done by runners then it will gladly give up the more energy required fruit production.

[Asica]

It is actually not a strawberry. I forgot the English name. It is a cousin of strawberry. It will not send out shooters. The plant will just get bigger. The fruit is long, narrow, sweet, and small. I love the taste of it.

[Katten]

Thanks for your replies.

I have repotted the strawberry, so now it has place to stretch out its roots. I did the pollinating with a q-tip, doing pretty much the same thing as with my peppers, which were pollinated successfully. I haven't given it any special fertilizer as all of my plants get generous amounts of vermicompost, but I will look into it and see if I can get it some nutri-drink.

I am pretty sure the package of the seeds said 'strawberry', but you could be right.