Today was the first day of meteorological spring and it was a gorgeous day so I figured it was time to wake up the strawberry patch. Surprisingly, the garden was fairly dry so I also went ahead and started working in all of those shredded oak leaves Dad gave me. This was a real chore taking nearly all of the afternoon. Once they begin to rot down some, I'll do one final deep till and the plot should be ready to go for spring planting.
The berry patch survived the winter in great shape and some of the crowns were already sending up new leaves through the straw blanket I put down last fall. I pulled off the straw, mowed the leaves down being careful not to hit the crowns, aerated between the crowns with a turning fork, added in some limestone and a pound of 10-10-10, and then topped it all off with an inch or so of chopped straw. This should get things moving for a second year of production.
I was supposed to have had lettuce seedlings ready to go into the black film by now but life has been busy so I hope to get the plant lights up from the basement this week. The raspberries are just beginning to show some buds too and I can't wait to see how things turn out for their first year of fruit production.
