Self-replicating strawberries the easy way!

I grow antique strawberries on my homestead. Yes, they're not a large as modern strawberries, but their taste is awesome. They have grown on my land since before I bought it, but they need to move around to new areas every 3-4 years.

At the moment, I'm having to grow them in large containers because our deer like strawberry leaves as much as I like the berries. Strawberry plants tend to die if every one of their leaves gets deer browsed.

The absolutely easiest way I've found to move strawberry plants is to fill a bunch of pots with good dirt (homemade compost, mixed with dirt, biochar, and a bit of coir because of our summer drought)



I put the pots into a bin so it's easy to water them and they don't get tipped over.

Then I lead a runner into a pot and put a friendly rock on top of the stem to keep the stem in the pot and to act as a bit of mulch on the surface to help keep the pot moist.

The top right baby was rooted earlier this year and has been separated from its mother plant already. This is just the safest place to put it until late fall planting.

The other five pots just got set up today. I try not to get too far ahead of myself, but I am thinking I really need to set up another group of 6 as my daughter in law has discovered she really likes strawberries!

For 30 years, these lovely strawberries have been self replicating!

The container approach is smart with deer pressure like that. I do something similar with mine, let the runners root into small pots sat next to the mother plant and then just move the pots wherever I need new plants. Saves disturbing roots and you get a head start compared to bare runners. The old varieties are worth the extra effort too, the flavour difference is massive even if the berries are smaller.

Mine have been running for several weeks now. I'm glad to see your method, as it is much more compact than my messy messy plan.

Thanks!

If you have more aggressive runners that send multiple nodes, you can actually root from each node. So you could get, say, six starts off of one stolon.

As an alternative look at strawberry propagation, consider that seed grown strawberries aren't too hard either.

Lots of different methods, but if you cut a thin slice of strawberry, close to the surface so you have seeds all across one side of the slice, and bury it in good potting soil with the seeds facing upwards (and you should barely cover the top of the seeds with soil), then keep it moist for the next week (you can use the plastic over the pot trick, but don't let it get too hot or the seeds will rot), you'll see a bunch of little strawberry seedlings growing. You can keep them growing for awhile and then loosen the soil and pull them apart, or break the clump into a couple-few small pieces, plant in pots and thin down to a single plant (my preference). You can get ≈ 4-8 slices out of any strawberry that isn't a virginiana (in which case just use the whole berry), so you can get quite a few seedlings going from a single strawberry.

In this way, you can clone using stolons (runners) but freshen genetics+develop locally adapted cultivars with the seedlings.

It looks like what I do with my Wild Strawberries (Fragaria vesca). They like to send their runners over the paths. But that's where I want to walk, not to have strawberries. So I let the runners grow roots in a pot, and then plant them in a god spot.
BTW these Wild Strawberries have tiny fruits (varying from a few millimeters to about a centimeter, so that's less than half an inch), but their taste is delicious, incomparable!

Chance Lunceford wrote:As an alternative look at strawberry propagation, consider that seed grown strawberries aren't too hard either.

Lots of different methods, but if you cut a thin slice of strawberry, close to the surface so you have seeds all across one side of the slice, and bury it in good potting soil with the seeds facing upwards (and you should barely cover the top of the seeds with soil), then keep it moist for the next week (you can use the plastic over the pot trick, but don't let it get too hot or the seeds will rot), you'll see a bunch of little strawberry seedlings growing. You can keep them growing for awhile and then loosen the soil and pull them apart, or break the clump into a couple-few small pieces, plant in pots and thin down to a single plant (my preference). You can get ≈ 4-8 slices out of any strawberry that isn't a virginiana (in which case just use the whole berry), so you can get quite a few seedlings going from a single strawberry.

In this way, you can clone using stolons (runners) but freshen genetics+develop locally adapted cultivars with the seedlings.

Wonderful idea!  My container strawberries are currently being assaulted by chipmunks, who rarely eat a whole berry but also rarely leave a whole berry for me. 😠  I can take what's left of a chipmunk snack and slice a side off that still has seeds, and plant that into a container to start some new plants.  I'll do that today with a partial berry I saw this morning that was still attached to its stem, and see how it goes.  Thanks for the idea!

Donna Lynn wrote:

Chance Lunceford wrote:As an alternative look at strawberry propagation, consider that seed grown strawberries aren't too hard either.

Lots of different methods, but if you cut a thin slice of strawberry, close to the surface so you have seeds all across one side of the slice, and bury it in good potting soil with the seeds facing upwards (and you should barely cover the top of the seeds with soil), then keep it moist for the next week (you can use the plastic over the pot trick, but don't let it get too hot or the seeds will rot), you'll see a bunch of little strawberry seedlings growing. You can keep them growing for awhile and then loosen the soil and pull them apart, or break the clump into a couple-few small pieces, plant in pots and thin down to a single plant (my preference). You can get ≈ 4-8 slices out of any strawberry that isn't a virginiana (in which case just use the whole berry), so you can get quite a few seedlings going from a single strawberry.

In this way, you can clone using stolons (runners) but freshen genetics+develop locally adapted cultivars with the seedlings.

Wonderful idea!  My container strawberries are currently being assaulted by chipmunks, who rarely eat a whole berry but also rarely leave a whole berry for me. 😠  I can take what's left of a chipmunk snack and slice a side off that still has seeds, and plant that into a container to start some new plants.  I'll do that today with a partial berry I saw this morning that was still attached to its stem, and see how it goes.  Thanks for the idea!

Keep us posted

Chance Lunceford wrote:If you have more aggressive runners that send multiple nodes, you can actually root from each node. So you could get, say, six starts off of one stolon.

As an alternative look at strawberry propagation, consider that seed grown strawberries aren't too hard either.

Lots of different methods, but if you cut a thin slice of strawberry, close to the surface so you have seeds all across one side of the slice, and bury it in good potting soil with the seeds facing upwards (and you should barely cover the top of the seeds with soil), then keep it moist for the next week (you can use the plastic over the pot trick, but don't let it get too hot or the seeds will rot), you'll see a bunch of little strawberry seedlings growing. You can keep them growing for awhile and then loosen the soil and pull them apart, or break the clump into a couple-few small pieces, plant in pots and thin down to a single plant (my preference). You can get ≈ 4-8 slices out of any strawberry that isn't a virginiana (in which case just use the whole berry), so you can get quite a few seedlings going from a single strawberry.

In this way, you can clone using stolons (runners) but freshen genetics+develop locally adapted cultivars with the seedlings.

I just did this, and took some photos. See below:

Chance Lunceford wrote:...

I just did this, and took some photos. See below:

I am very interested to see how this goes on! I never tried this. I only duplicated strawberry plants by using the runners.

Chance Lunceford wrote:

Donna Lynn wrote: Wonderful idea!  My container strawberries are currently being assaulted by chipmunks, who rarely eat a whole berry but also rarely leave a whole berry for me. 😠  I can take what's left of a chipmunk snack and slice a side off that still has seeds, and plant that into a container to start some new plants.  I'll do that today with a partial berry I saw this morning that was still attached to its stem, and see how it goes.  Thanks for the idea!

Keep us posted

It's been about two weeks, and nothing has sprouted yet.  I keep the soil consistently moist, and the container is outside in dappled shade/sun in zone 5.  There is a slight possibility a chipmunk dug it up and ate it, but I don't see any obvious soil disturbance like I normally do when they dig in my plants.  I'll keep watching...

Donna Lynn wrote:
It's been about two weeks, and nothing has sprouted yet.  I keep the soil consistently moist, and the container is outside in dappled shade/sun in zone 5.  There is a slight possibility a chipmunk dug it up and ate it, but I don't see any obvious soil disturbance like I normally do when they dig in my plants.  I'll keep watching...

Well, heck. I'd be interested to see if there are still seeds present. If so, I'd keep going for awhile. Sometimes strawberry seeds can be stubborn. If they haven't sprouted by 6 weeks, I'd call that a straightforward miss.

Donna Lynn wrote:

It's been about two weeks, and nothing has sprouted yet.  I keep the soil consistently moist, and the container is outside in dappled shade/sun in zone 5.  There is a slight possibility a chipmunk dug it up and ate it, but I don't see any obvious soil disturbance like I normally do when they dig in my plants.  I'll keep watching...

Darn rodent land mates!  I have prairie dogs.  It amounts to the same thing, they just don’t recognize common goals!

🤞🤞🤞 for your berry seedlings!

I want to germinate strawberries as well!  I first have to find some of the wild type strawberries.  I do have 4 live plants I planted earlier this year.  I think if I want to move towards arid alkaline high elevation tolerance I want to start with simpler genetics instead of strawberry heritage that has been through so many years of commercial production and propagation, complete with fungicides.  I guess just to practice the process, I could try any strawberry I can get my hands on!

Again good luck on the seeds you have come so far with