How to cover strawberries so they don’t freeze: winter is just around the corner – questions that worry summer residents

An idle opinion about the frost resistance of strawberries can cause, if not disaster, then serious trouble.

Experienced gardeners urge to ignore such advice, since frost has never been beneficial to any fruit crop, especially in a winter with little snow.

Anastasia Kovrizhnykh, an expert of the online publication "BelNovosti", an agronomist and landscape designer, told how to cover strawberries for the winter.

Strawberries and frosts

Strawberries will not freeze over the winter if they are left open, but the question is how long will it take for them to recover after such a winter and what kind of harvest will a frivolous summer resident collect?

Therefore, strawberries need to be covered in order to save the future harvest.

Cover strawberries correctly

1. You don't have to worry until the thermometer drops to 0 degrees Celsius. After that, you can start covering the berry bush.

2. Before this time, you need to clear the beds of weeds and other vegetation, cut off diseased and damaged leaves, carry out fertilizing, processing, and watering.

3. It is best to use agrofibre as a covering material, even if a thaw begins or in the spring it is not possible to open the berry bush on time, the material will not harm the plants.

It allows air and moisture to pass through and at the same time protects against frost.

4. You can use film, but you need to remember that in a warm winter the berry bush may rot.

5. Straw and pine branches, popular among the people, hold snow well, thanks to which strawberries overwinter in comfortable and natural conditions.

But rodents often spend the winter under them, which can damage the plantings.

6. As for mulching with peat, there is a risk of increasing the acidity of the soil, and in the spring, because of it, the soil will warm up much longer, which will again affect the harvest.

Useful tips

In any case, when choosing a material for covering the beds, the gardener should think about the possibility of ventilation so that excess moisture does not accumulate in the berry patch.

Also, you should not rush to cover strawberries in the fall and uncover them in the spring. In the fall, you need to wait for stable cold weather, and in the spring, avoid a sharp cold snap.

You also need to remember the characteristics of the variety being grown.