On our garden/farm we grow a few kinds of strawberries that each have their merits and their challenges.
Admittedly, we might be slight shopaholics when it comes to plants.
Because of this, we have a little “home gardener” patch of strawberries that has had everything from “Alexandria” to “Seascape” to “Pineberry” and many more.
We also have two commercial varieties we grow. A day neutral/ everbearing called “Albion” and a June bearing called “Honeoye”.
We love them all, but have to admit there are challenges to growing them.
“Pineberry”, a white strawberry with a flavor reminiscent of pineapple, for instance, requires another berry nearby to set fruit.
“Alexandria” and “Seascape” are small everbearing types closely related to their wild counterparts, which makes them fairly hardy. They set such a small amount of fruit, though, that its difficult to recommend them as a primary berry for the hungry gardener!
“Albion” is notoriously finicky when it comes to powdery mildew, but it’s real enemy is anthracnose. It is susceptible to both the crown rot and fruit rot variety. Fungicides seem to work well to control the crown rot, but the fruit rot type is harder to control. I believe it must have something to do with getting that fungicide on the entire plant where the fungus cannot fall onto the fruit.
Ultimately, any of these and many more can be grown here, but fungicide treatment is recommended as soon as you see new growth in the spring. Repeat once you start to see blooms and then every week there after for everbearing types.
A strawberry plant doesn’t last forever, but thankfully strawberries are self renewing. As long as you keep them fairly healthy and allow them to self propagate, you can have many years of healthy and productive plants.
