We have wild strawberry plants in the raised garden bed - in front of the cabin. The wild strawberry plants were one of the first signs of green that we saw this spring. They were also the first to produce fruit. Everyday this past week I have harvested ripe red wild strawberries. Last year they produced into fall, so there's a good chance that they will also be the last fruit to be harvested this year.

Wild strawberries are smaller than most store bought strawberries, but they are packed with flavor. I usually eat more than a few in the morning, only half of the harvest makes it to the fridge.

Growing New Wild Strawberry Plants

Most strawberry plants produce much less fruit after 5 years, so it's important for new strawberry plants to grow each year to replace the older strawberry plants. There are a couple easy ways to grow new strawberry plants - with runners or with seeds.

Growing New Strawberry Plants from Runners

Some strawberry plants don't send out runners, but wild strawberry plants do. You can see the old runners from last year in the picture below that was taken a few weeks ago.

After the plant has established itself it will send above ground 'runners' that have nodes that new strawberry plants will start to grow from. In the picture below you can see I cut a small hole in the black garden fabric, placed the runner node onto the dirt through the cut hole, then placed a rock on either side of the node to hold it in place. A couple days after watering, roots will grow into the ground from the leaf node.

The runner node can also be placed into a cup with dirt if you would like to easily transplant the new wild strawberry plant elsewhere.

Growing New Strawberry Plants with Seeds from Last Year

Another great way to grow new wild strawberry plants is from seed. In the picture below you can see the strawberry that was left on the plant over the winter.

Especially after being though the cold winter, those strawberry seeds were ready to plant. You can see the wild strawberry seedlings in the picture below from the wintered strawberry seeds that I planted two weeks ago.

Wild Strawberry Transplanting

A few weeks ago there were wild strawberry plants near the shower bed that I wanted to move to the raised bed strawberry patch before they bloomed. Click the GIF below to watch the full wild strawberry transplanting video.

They were moved just in time - a week later the strawberry patch was full of blossoms and green strawberries.

Below is a pair of pictures showing the wild strawberry raised garden bed in daily harvest mode.

The Harvest

I've found that fully ripe red strawberries easily pull off the plant. If the strawberry does not pull off easily, usually the backside is not quite ripe.

The Wild Strawberries that I don't eat during harvest will be stored in a freezer until there is enough to make batch of strawberry jam.

Have a great day!