Easy watering strawberry planter

Step 6 Coping with the enevitable problems.../tips

My first strawberry planter had a drainage hole.  Probably because the strawberry planter people are used to stupid people filling the things up with water, the roots sit in the water stagnating and rotting and then they die.

I shoved it full of a plastic lid from our ready fried poppadom container.  Works lovely.

Don't feel you have to fill up all the holes with strawberries - you could of course plant a few other plants like herbs etc - though don't choose an invasive species like mint.

Don't water it before moving it into position.  It'll double in weight and these things aren't light in the first place.

Compost has enough food in it to maintain plants for the first 6-8 weeks, after that it'll need feeding.  You can make free feed from rotting down nettles in water.  This stinks but is a great free fertiliser.  You can do the same with sea weed - just wash off excess salt first.

Otherwise pop down the road and buy a bottle of veg feed and follow the instructions.

You'll need to turn the planter every few days so that all sides of the pot get a good sunning - especially important when berries start to form.