What is a permaculture strawberry? Its a strawberry harvested with minimum effort, inputs, fertilisers, pesticides, bird netting or irrigation, thats what!
We’d given up on our strawberry patch this spring, thinking that the white clover seeded in the pathways had moved in and overwhelmed it, along with remnant quack grass (see photo above). But, come July, Penny peered into the ‘weeds’ and discovered vast amounts of berries waiting to ripen. We cut a little of the clover back…and left it, finding ourselves too busy with our heritage garlic crop!
Checking back a couple of weeks later, we found a beautiful & abundant crop! The high clover provided nitrogen fixation, hid the strawberries from birds & insects, and acted as a living mulch. We used irrigation, added no fertiliser or pesticides & needed no bird netting.