Fruity, fun and favourite

At times like this its great to do something that makes you smile, but has the added bonus of providing a source of fresh fruit without a trip to the supermarket! We weren't planning on growing much soft fruit this year, as they can be quite demanding on time, particularly keeping them watered - however as we know all things have changed somewhat recently and easily accessible fresh fruit has now moved rather high up the list for all.

Our strawberries have been given a new home, last year we grew them in planters along the side of the tunnel, but them demanded a lot of watering due to the shallow troughs.

Nice little plants, about to come to their own as 2-year old plants, we removed them from their troughs, cut back all the dead material to leave bright new green leaves, ready for spring.

Making use of what was to hand Melv made some planters - originally for the aquaponics, the numerous blue barrels acquired for filters were ideal.

Each barrel provides a home for 25 plants:

Melv began planting them up in a mix of muck and compost - lovely. Three different varieties - Elsanta - early variety, Ostara - perpetual (keep going) variety and Pineberry - a white strawberry for a bit of fun!

The plants looked well in their new home and the Pineberrys are even in flower...

So which will be first - we wait and see - 5 barrels planted, 125 strawberry plants - yum - 1 inside and 4 outside - the race is on... Lovely