Our strawberries have long since gone the way of the slug, but now is the time to sort out those suckers to ensure a good crop next summer.
(Or rainy season, if you prefer the correct technical term).
Strawberry plants tend to be past their best after 4 years but each year they brilliantly send out suckers that bed down to form new plants.
Think of them as the GB Olympic cycling team, thus:
My 2-year-old ‘Wiggins’ plants have had a great year… lots of strawberries (medals) this summer (Olympics), with a couple more years of strawberry (medal) producing (winning) to go.
My 4-year-old ‘Hoy’ plants have had a good summer (Olympics) but are now sending out suckers (Kenny, Trott) to rejuvenate the strawberry patch (GB Olympic cycling team) before they wither and die (retire from competitive sport).
You can leave them to root down where they choose, but it’s easier to place them in a pot of compost, severing the stem from the mother plant at around 4 weeks when established. I usually pin the stems down with small stones to stop the plant flopping around and falling out (the entire French Olympic cycling team) of the plant pot (velodrome).
hah. You realise you’ve already complicated the difficult art of gardening by comparing it to the even more complicated sport of track cycling?