Over the weekend I’ve been diligently working on filling my new garden boxes. I didn’t have enough material to fill all nine of them, but I made sure that I had at least one completely filled so that I could transplant my emerging strawberry plants.
Last year, I planted my strawberries in rows. They did okay… they lived, so that was good! I harvested a few strawberries, but I didn’t expect that many seeing as these were first year plants.
This year I decided that my strawberries would probably stand a better chance being planted in a raised bed rather than staying in the clay soil they were in. I dug up 37 strawberry plants, soaked and trimmed their roots, and moved them to their new home in the bed. I spaced them about 6″ apart.
There are still about a dozen more in the ground, but I simply didn’t have room in the box for them.
This particular raised bed is 4′ x 6′ and 12 in. deep. I decided to fill it using the Lasagna method, as the materials cost me nothing. I layered like this:
A single layer of cardboard down first, soaked with the hose.
- 1-2 inches of composted horse manure/barn litter.
- 2-3 inches of straw/hay.
- 1-2 inches of composted horse manure/barn litter.
- 2-3 inches of crumbled leaves.
- 2-3 inches of composted horse manure/barn litter, mixed with top soil.
I wasn’t able to fill the box to the top, but it was close enough. I’m *hoping* this combination will do well. I simply used whatever free organic materials I had available to me. The boxes were constructed out of scrap lumber.
Once the strawberries were in the bed, I watered them well and mulched around each little plant with straw. I am anxious to watch them grow!
This is one of my Sparkle strawberry plants – in full bloom:
A city girl learning to homestead on an acre of land in the country. Wife and homeschooling mother of four. Enjoying life, and everything that has to do with self sufficient living.
Hi Kendra, love your blog. i was wondering what is the purpose of the “lasagna” method of planting?
Hi Kay,
Lasagna gardening is pretty much layering different types of compostable materials to build a garden bed. It adds lots of nutrients to your garden. It’s also less expensive than buying bags of soil if you already have compost, livestock manure, leaves, grass clippings, small twigs, stuff like that, laying around anyways.
And now, see, I’m moving mine OUT of a raised bed and into rows. They did wonderfully he first summer, but when fall came and the walnuts dropped, the juice hurt my plants, and the next year they didn’t do so well. Frankly, the box is in a bad place, so it needs to move, and my runners are SOOO long, I wanted to try to pinch some off and get new plants. But you can’t do that in a box. So I’m going to go to rows, so that I can ‘grow’ my patch.
anna-
The rows will do well, as long as your soil is good. I got tons of baby runner plants off of the “mother” plants, so my original 25 plants has almost doubled!! I’m hoping I will still get rooted runners in my bed to be transplanted later. Good luck with yours! And yes, keep them away from the Walnuts! 🙂
Years ago I used this method and the strawberries did okay. Only I got lots of black widows that decided it was a nice place to live – but unless you have them in your area, you needn’t worry. I think they would have invaded where I planted no matter what method I used. I’d love to hear if anyone has an organic method of deterring these spiders.