strawberry plants and VegTrug

whitesatin

Hi, This year I planted some strawberry plants in my VegTrug and they have been quite successful. Well, what I mean is that the grandchildren have always been able to find a strawberry or two. They have, kind of, taken over the large planter and I am intending to leave them there with the hope that next year I'll get more of a yield. My question is, what to do with the large number of runners that are hanging out of the trug, almost reaching the patio it stands on? Should I just cut these back? I could hook them up and let them grow in the trug but it's already pretty crowded. Would it be best just to cut them off and, possibly try to grow more in containers next year? I've cut back on ground space this year and the garden is mostly containers as I can't do as much as I would like to.

System

If you want more plants then by all means plant the new runners in other pots. If youve got enough then cut the runners off as they take a lot out of the main plant.

safestored4

Transplant some of the strongest of the runners into large containers and grow them on. Cut off the rest for the reasons stated above.

Next year after the original strawberries you have planted in the VegTdrug this year have cropped discard them and replace them with strong runners from either those thrown out from the VegTrug or the containers.

You could leave them an extra year but in such a confined space you will get better results from a more frequent pattern of transplanting. And when you refill the VegTrug before planting replace all of the soil/compost beforehand.

whitesatin

Thank you both for your most helpful comments.