Make An Old-Time Strawberry Barrel

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Do select one strong runner (snip off the rest) from each non-Alpine berry plant, and plug the baby plant into a plastic pot filled with soil and suspended from the barrel rim by a length of coat hanger formed in a hanger-hook on top and a pot-hanger loop at the bottom. When plantlets are rooted, transplant to the garden and keep blossoms and runners pinched off. In the late fall, dig plants, store with roots in moist sawdust in a cool dry place over winter and use to replace the less thrifty parent plants the following spring.

Setting new plants into a planting hole in the barrel takes patience and a deft hand. Use an old dull-ended table knife to lever the wood or slate chip covering the top of the hole up into the planting medium. Dig out the old plant and use a spoon to remove a core of soil and root pieces three inches deep into barrel. Soak roots of new plants inside hole with dilute liquid fertilizer.

Insert new plant roots into planting hole and spread into a fan as much as possible. Be sure roots are all inside barrel but bud and stems are outside. Fill a narrow trowel with soil mix, place tip into hole, resting gently on top of plant bud, and push soil—little bits at a time—into the hole with table knife. Push soil all the way to the back of the open core, and pack tight as you can without bruising the new plant. Then, use knife to lever the wood or slate chip down to close the upper portion of the hole again.

When Alpine plants begin showing the red leaves of viral disease or production begins to slow, start a new batch of seeds. Renew conventional runner-grown plants with their own runner clones captured in hanging pots, or from a bundle of nursery-grown plants.

Break down the barrel and replace soil every few years—especially if foliage is turning red prematurely, or you find that plants are easy to pull out of the soil and roots appear rotten. It is a good idea to let barrels rest—empty of soil and open to the rain and sun—for a season every so often to discourage buildup of mold diseases in the wood.

Harvesting the Sun

To reflect growth-promoting sunlight toward the plants at the shaded back of the barrel, tack strips of aluminum flashing or used printing plates from the local newspaper—the shiniest side of the aluminum facing out—tacked to simple rectangular wooden frames about as high and wide as the barrel. Arrange them at the back and to each side of the barrel, canted at an angle so they direct sunlight on the plants at the rear.

Strawberry plants will survive most any degree of cold, but need protection from drying winter winds—even in the South. Once plants have gone dormant after hard frost in the fall, sheath the barrel in tubes of tar paper with straw packed loosely between barrel and tar paper, or in a wrapped bandage of dark burlap. Cover the top with burlap even if you use tar paper around the sides, so water can get through. Do not enclose the barrels in plastic sheeting or the plants will suffocate.

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