Has anyone had experience with taking cuttings from a strawberry plant? I wanted to expand my fall strawberry plants from 4 to 12 but I've never taken cuttings from strawberry before so I don't know how successful it will be. I wanted to know how well cuttings have done for you in the past or if it caused any damage to the original plant? did the cutting survive? Should I use rooting hormone? Any advice is welcome. Thanks Stephanie
I take cuttings every year. After fruiting I continue watering the plants and caring for them until fall. During this time, they develop runners which have small plantlets on them. In mid-august I remove selected plantlets and plant them in a new bed which I prepare at least a month before I actually plant the new plantlets. I have never used rooting hormones because the roots on the plantlets were always sufficient. I also place some extra plants in small pots or flower boxes so that I have some "back-ups" for the few plants that inevitably die during the course of the winter. **I let the plantlets on the runners just root themselves in the soil where they develop....usually. Sometimes I actually go to the trouble of filling little plant pots with soil and plant the developing plantlets in those. I sink the little plant pots into the ground so that the runners remain parallel with the surface of the ground. I know that there are other folks that grow strawberries on here and hopefully they will give you their ideas on this subject as well. Good luck!
I grow lots of strawberries also. I basically do the same as Sjoerd. After they are done with the berries, i take the runners that have formed all season and cut at the mother plant. There is usually 2-3 plantlets on one string. i cut the string near each plantlet and just stick in soil that has been prepared in advance and let them do what they do natural. Grow! Thats it. Being where i live, i do have some that is a planter that is off the ground and those i do cover in winter. Basically so in spring its not one huge ice sculpture that is one, less thing i have to break the ice on.
Thanks so much, I went & looked closer in my plants & there are runners with plants & sure enough tiny roots. I am going to try your suggestion today. I am in Florida, & we have to seasons, Very Hot Summer & Not As hot Spring, winter & Fall, so I grow plants year round.
I am a bit jelous of your ability to grow things all year round there. I do that too, but on a much, much smaller acale than you I imagine. I was wondering if you grow Perpetual Strawberries. I would imagine that they would be ideal for the sort of climatic conditions that you have there. Some folks do not feel that they taste as good as convential ones...but there's something to be said for being able to eat strawbs all year round. BTW--I don't know if it will help, but I had written something about strawberries on this forum some months ago. here is the link:\ http://www.gardenstew.com/about8218.html
