3rd yr strawberries: worth it?

[SPierce]

I wanted to ask everyone here their opinions, since ya'll know WAY more than me

Long story short, I've got a 2nd year strawberry patch out in my garden at the moment. It's taken/taking up so much room, and spreading across so much of the garden, that, as long as I love having strawberries, I'm debating taking them out for next year so that I can start/have more room in the beds to work with for fall crops, and I would like to plant some more vining plants- like cantaloupe and watermelon, next year. Pulling the strawberries will allow me to do that. If I keep them in, I'll be out of room.

I picked about 20 berries from them this year, and currently they aren't producing anymore strawberries... is that all I'm going to have from them this year, or are they going to grow more?

[DoubleDogFarm]

What variety of strawberry?

Eric

[SPierce]

What variety of strawberry?

Eric

Not sure- I bought them from home depot, without any tags as to what type they were. Here's a photo of them, though, if it helps. They're about the size of the tip of my finger

[img]https://i24.photobucket.com/albums/c25/Liskarialeman/Photo113.jpg[/img]

[DoubleDogFarm]

Sorry, That doesn't help me anyway.

I'm thinking if they are a June bearing variety, they are pretty much done. If they are an everbearing variety they should bear until frost.

I would remove them and plant either Tristar or Seascape everbearing type. You will get fruit the first year planted.

Eric

[applestar]

I'm experimenting with interplanting deeper rooted vegs among the strawberries. In the past,, tomatoes worked well if lower leaves are pruned and garlic and onions to some extent -- the onions didn't get very big but That may not be the strawberry's fault and worked well if I was just harvesting them as green onions. I think peas would have worked if I had supported them better. Some of my other strawberries are ground cover for shrub size Japanese Maple trees and cherry espaliers.

This year, I planted eggplants among the strawberries and planted new strawberry plants in front of the rhubarb

[SPierce]

I've got peppers planted in between them.. but sadly still lacking room. want to plant more things that vine, instead of growing up! I think I'm going to pull them this fall.

[bogydave]

The mother plants are good producer the first year & OK the 2nd year. Just pot some of the runners & replace the mother plants with the new ones.
After harvest every year; Commercial growers plow across the rows & leaving a few mother plants , re-dress the rows & let the runners fill in the empty part of the rows. They always have new young plants producing well.
SIL was a strawberry grower, it was one of his jobs after harvest.
When you pull an old plant you'll notice the roots are smaller & fewer than a 1 year old plant.