Everyone knows that strawberries are the queen of the garden. As a rule, not a single amateur gardener can do on his plot without these beautiful, healthy and tasty berries. A vertical bed for strawberries is an excellent replacement for the usual planting method, which takes up quite a lot of space on the site.
What can be vertical beds
A vertical bed for strawberries is one of the ways to grow these wonderful berries, which saves space in the garden.
Currently, a huge number of the most diverse designs of different shapes and heights have been invented. Often use boxes that are installed in several tiers, or bags suspended on a support and filled with soil. Also used are plastic containers and bottles, car tires, pipes, etc. They are placed in the form of a pyramid or whatnot. You can equip vertical beds in the garden, greenhouse, front garden and, if desired, even in the middle of the courtyard, as the original design can decorate the landscape design of absolutely any site.
Vertical bed for strawberries: reviews
According to gardeners, such designs have several advantages.
The undoubted advantage of the vertical cultivation of strawberries is a significant saving in space. With this method of planting, plant bushes are located one above the other and do not occupy a large area. The yield with proper care from one square meter of such structures can be 6-7 times higher than the usual planting. For normal growth, a height of 26-30 cm will be enough for a strawberry bush, so that about 7 tiers can be placed on a 2 m post. At the same time, the fact that the bushes release a short mustache that does not take root makes it much easier to care. Caring for plants, removing their antennae, dressing, picking berries and other work is much easier to carry out compared to the usual planting of strawberries. Vertical beds for strawberries allow you to process from 6 to 15 bushes at a time without much difficulty.
Another considerable advantage of vertical beds is a fairly simple care. Due to the fact that the seedlings or berries are high, when weeding or harvesting it will not be necessary to bend low and “tear” the back.
Due to the fact that the vertical beds for strawberries are located high from the ground, the roots of plants and berries are protected from damage by small pests and rodents. And due to the pyramidal or cylindrical shape of the structure, birds cannot land on it and eat the crop.
Growing strawberries on these beds is especially attractive for children who are very enthusiastic about caring for plants. In addition, they can eat berries directly from the bushes without prior washing.
Specifics of growing
Growing strawberries on vertical beds has some of its own characteristics:
- Limited amount of soil. Typically, a vertical bed for strawberries consists of containers mounted on top of each other or having an elongated shape. Due to this, the volume of soil in them is not as large as on a normal bed.
- Difficulty with watering. The limited-volume soil dries quickly, so it will have to be watered almost every day. If it is not possible to often appear on the site, then it makes sense to think about drip irrigation. There is another small trick: the soil in vertical beds will remain moist longer if hydrogel is added to it (small balls that absorb and retain water during irrigation and then give it to the plant). You can buy it in almost every garden or flower shop
- Higher feeding requirements. In small volumes of soil, nutrients are quickly "eaten" by plants. Almost two weeks after planting, they will need additional fertilizing from the outside. You will have to feed strawberries with fertilizers regularly - at least once a week.
- Freezing soil in the winter. In winter, soil in vertical beds turns into a dense, hard and impenetrable lump. The roots of the plant do not stand the test of cold and die. To prevent this from happening, the initially vertical bed for strawberries is conceived as mobile, portable. In this case, in the cold season, it can be brought into an ice-free room.
Some tips for arranging vertical beds
Before making a vertical bed for strawberries, we recommend that you familiarize yourself with a few valuable tips:
- Volumetric structures of vertical beds are best collected immediately at a constant place, because there may be certain difficulties with their transportation;
- a bed of berries is placed on the sunny side;
- the ground for filling containers must be prepared in advance. It includes peat, sandy loam soil, hydrogel and fertilizers (rotted compost is perfect);
- it is recommended to place vertical strawberry beds with your own hands as close as possible to the source of water, because you will have to water them quite often;
- You also need to immediately think about protecting the structure in winter: whether it will be brought into the room, covered, etc.
Vertical Pvc Bed
For work you will need:
- PVC pipe having a diameter of more than 150 mm;
- PVC pipe with a diameter of 100 mm and a length greater than the previous 15 cm;
- drill and chisel;
- burlap and rope;
- a cap or reinforced tape ;
- soil, drainage and seedlings.
Work Stages:
- First of all, the pipes must be cut to the required height. It should be remembered that a pipe with a smaller diameter should be 10-15 cm longer than the main one.
- In the upper part of a narrow pipe designed for watering plants, you need to drill the holes necessary to leak water.
- To protect the structure from clogging, it is best to wrap the watering pipe with a piece of non-woven material or burlap and tightly wind it with a strong rope. Cover the lower end with no holes with tape.
- Now we drill holes for strawberries in a pipe with a large diameter. This is done using a drill with a special nozzle. The most optimal size is considered to be 15 cm, the location from each other is about 20-25 cm. At the bottom there is an indent from the ground at least 15-20 cm.
- Next, put a plug on the pipe below, install the structure vertically and firmly attach it to the support.
- Now we insert a narrow watering pipe into it, and fill the gap between them by 10 cm with gravel or expanded clay.
- We fill the rest of the space tightly with earth and gradually fill it with water so that there are no layers of air.
- We plant strawberry bushes in the holes.
All subsequent plant care is regular watering, which occurs through a narrow pipe. In the future, all fertilizers will be applied only in liquid form.
Vertical beds from plastic bags
You can make such compact vertical beds at home yourself. To do this, you need to purchase:
- a durable film with a thickness of 0.2 mm or more;
- sewing machine;
- sharp knife;
- soil and seedlings.
Work Stages:
- First of all, you need to cut two rectangles, the size of which corresponds to the future vertical bed, but taking into account the allowance on each side of about 1.5-2 cm.
- Sew them together or solder them with a special soldering iron, sew on a durable handle that can support the weight of the soil bag.
- The resulting bag should be densely filled with nutrient-rich soil.
- Make cuts for planting strawberries (the distance between them should be about 20 cm).
- Plant seedlings.
- Further care is regular watering and fertilizer.
Vertical beds from car tires
Auto owners sometimes become unusable tires, which can also be used to obtain wonderful vertical beds.
To work, you need to prepare:
- tires of different sizes;
- a chisel;
- wooden block;
- soil and seedlings.
Due to the metal cord present in the rim of the tires, there is no need for the equipment of the frame. The vertical bed for strawberries from tires is as follows:
- First of all, we make holes for seedlings using a chisel for this. We put the tire on the block and from the inside we break through the “windows” in several places.
- Set in a permanent place and fall asleep with soil for stability.
- We prepare subsequent tires in the same way and lay them in the form of a pyramid to the desired height. However, it is worth considering that too high a vertical bed for strawberries will cause inconvenience during irrigation.
- We fill the mounted structure with earth, carefully plant seedlings in the holes, water it and wait for the first strawberry to appear.
Vertical beds, photos of which are presented in our article, look very harmoniously not only in the garden, but also on the balcony.
Second way
For him you will need:
- tires of different diameters;
- soil and plants.
Work Stages:
- Car tires are simply exposed in the form of a pyramid (we do not make holes), starting with the largest diameter and ending with the smallest.
- On top, if desired, you can arrange a cache-pot.
- We fill the soil in stages, after installing each subsequent tire.
Another option is a vertical bed for strawberries from a grid. The remains of the building mesh must be bent in the form of a pipe, fixed, covered with a film from the inside of the wall and filled with soil. Break through the film in the right places in a checkerboard pattern and plant strawberry seedlings. In the future, she will let out a mustache, which will also bear fruit. You need to plant seedlings from above so that the mustache, dropping down, can take root below. That's all! However, it should be borne in mind that on the sunny side the berries ripen faster, but on the shady side they may not appear at all. And yet, plants require frequent and plentiful watering.
But what about winter?
The best way to help strawberries overwinter is to take it out with a lump of soil, bury it in the ground and water it well. One must remember to compact the soil around. Additionally, the plant is covered only if necessary.
The vertical bed for strawberries in winter can be stored indoors or on the balcony. To do this, when stable frosts begin, and the soil in the container begins to freeze, you need to cover the strawberries with sawdust on top so that the temperature below them is not lower than -4 o C. When the thaw sets in, the plants should be ventilated, since plus temperatures can cause the warming up. In spring, as soon as a steady positive temperature sets in, around the beginning of March, you need to free the strawberries from the shelter.
Growing strawberries on the balcony
Strawberries can be grown in many ways, for example, in containers with different modifications. It looks great on the balcony of a cascade or a slide of pots of different sizes. In addition, for a vertical bed, you can use ordinary bags that are sewn from material used in gardening (for example, from a spantbond or other agricultural canvas that allow air and moisture to pass through). These bags are suspended or placed on a pallet.
Also, some do-it-yourself vertical beds similar to trellis. For its manufacture, they take a garden metal mesh, twist it in the form of a pipe and fasten it.
A crosslinked bag of agrofibre is inserted inside the net, fastened and cut holes in it for planting strawberry seedlings at a distance of about 15-20 cm.
In addition, you need to cut holes in the bottom of the bag to exit excess moisture. Further, this entire structure is placed in a large pot and filled up for stability with a sandy-sand mixture. Such containers can be made quite high, resulting in their own beds with growing strawberries on the balcony.