Strawberries

A strawberry bed is a three-season commitment of runner wrangling, netting, and mulch, paid back in June flavor no store manages. Bags of day-neutrals are the smaller promise; a June-bearer bed is the real one.

Growing

Plant bare-root crowns in April with the roots fanned and the crown exactly at soil level. June-bearers spend year one growing, flowers pinched off, and pay in year two; day-neutrals in bags fruit their first summer and keep going into August. After the June flush, let a few runners fill gaps, then thin hard in September and tuck straw around the plants once the ground cools. A bed left to manage itself becomes a mat of leaves and marbles inside three years. The bed is thirstiest while the berries size; let it run dry in June and the fruit comes in small and seedy.

Varieties

Jewel, bred at Cornell's Geneva station, is the region's June-bearer benchmark; Earliglow ripens first and tastes best; Albion is the day-neutral for bags.

Pests

Birds watch the bed more closely than the gardener does; netting goes on at first blush or the crop simply transfers ownership. Slugs take whatever fruit touches ground in a wet June, and clean straw under the trusses is the old fix and still the best one.

In the kitchen

The June flush is jam week. Day-neutrals arrive a bowl at a time and rarely survive to be cooked.