Transplanting Strawberries

Today didn’t go quite as planned. I was hoping to finish my daughter’s flower girl dress for an upcoming wedding but ran out of thread. The closest place I can think of to buy thread is 45 minutes away, so sewing will have to wait for another day. Instead, I found myself in the garden.

I transplanted most of my strawberries last fall but was left with a healthy clump that didn’t fit in my rows. I gave away several boxes of strawberry starts but couldn’t find anyone to take the rest. After babying those plants for a few years I was reluctant to throw them out, so today I made a new row for them.

First I brought the tiller out and got the whole garden tilled. I like to plant in soft, freshly tilled soil. Our tiller is relatively small and easy to manage, or so my husband says. When I’m tilling it’s often hard to tell who is in control, the tiller or me. I’d say 75% of the time I win and 25% goes to the tiller. I just never know when it’s going to bolt in an unforeseen direction, I’m just along for the ride.

I’m rarely alone, so my little helpers were getting very involved. While tilling I had them sit in the shade and eat lollipops but when it was time to dig in the dirt they were right there to help.

The starkly different personalities of my husband and I are clearly manifested in our gardening styles. I’d like to randomly plant rows running different directions with arbitrary plant selections. There is nothing calculated or measured about my rows or where things go. @justinmullet plants the garden with a plumb line and measuring stick. Each row is squared and perfectly symmetrical. The planting of each seed is a calculated effort destined for perfection. I once imagined us blissfully gardening together but those illusions vanished long ago. Now I know it is better for us to work on the garden independently, leaving most of the planting for him to ensure maximum aesthetic symmetry. I’m generally content to do the weeding, watering and harvesting.

You won’t see any perfect rows in my photos and you’ll also notice the plants aren’t evenly distributed. That’s okay, I’m happy and the girls had fun doing it with me. We chose an area far enough from the next row of strawberries that I could comfortably (i.e., safely) run the tiller between the rows then started moving dirt to accommodate the new plants.

While I dug up the plants my little helper placed them in the new row and covered the roots with dirt. She wasn’t sure what the roots were so we had a great teachable moment looking at the strawberry roots, talking about how we can’t let them dry out because that is how the plant gets its food and water. I love that my children can learn about nature while they get their hands and feet dirty as we work and have fun.

As we finished planting the last plant we discovered a big worm. He was gently touched and admired. When someone wanted to feed him to the chickens as a treat, I explained I’d rather keep him in the garden where he can cultivate and fertilize the soil. After understanding how the worm helps our plants grow better food everyone was in agreement that he would stay in the dirt and be our garden friend.

Stay tuned for some fresh berries in a couple months!