For anyone serious about strawberry farming, knowing about organic strawberry farming is of prime importance. This is especially applicable for small scale farmers.

These days with the growth of demand in locally produced berries, the commercial prospect of organic strawberry farming has increased manifolds. Strawberry farmers around the world are busy upgrading their farming methods in a bid to suit agro-farming to all climatic conditions.

Organic strawberry farming has really taken off with these berries commanding the best prices today. As most of us would probably be aware of organic strawberry farming is all about growing strawberries without the help of pesticides and synthetic fertilizers. The stress here is on growing fruits with the help of biological pest control and soil building measures that are completely natural in nature.

Before plunging into organic strawberry farming remember that the Federal organic standards have stringent standards for farms that claim to have organically grown crops. The farms have to be certified as organic by a USDA-accredited certification agency before it can actually claim to be a producer of organically grown strawberries.

While preparing your farm for organic strawberry farming make sure you have a few things planned ahead. Here are a few tips that could be used-
– Prepare your the soil well, make sure the soil contains a large amounts of organic matter within it. Remove all the grass and the weeds too, a pH level of 5.5 to 6.6 needs to be maintained in the soil. Further, you need to burrow two to three inches of compost on the top of the soil.

– Adequate sunlight is an absolute must for organic strawberry farming. Make sure that your far has at least six to seven hours of sunlight every day. If your plants are in the shade, you would do well to shift them to a sunny patch.

– Organic strawberry farming needs, good and reliable supply of water through the season. The plants should get regular supply of at least one inch of water every week.

– Strawberry plants need a well drained soil. Make sure that the water does not stand on the roots, otherwise the roots could rot leading to death of the plants. For this you could raise the bed of your plants, this will help drain the water fast.

– Since you don’t apply artificial fertiliers tour strawberry plants, make sure that you boost your plants with bone meal and blood meal. This needs to be done once a month within the period of June and September.

– Weeds are a big problem for those who do organic strawberry farming. biggest problems that organic strawberry growers face. Because of this basic weed-control ideas are an absolute necessity. Farmers using black plastic mulch have also at times been frustrated because weeds have emerged from the holes that had actually been made for the strawberry plants.

– Organic growers will find that some hand weeding is necessary. Weeds in organic plasticulture systems can become troublesome even where black plastic mulch is used. In such situations, the weeds emerge from the planting holes made for the strawberry plants. The rows must be straight and the plastic laid precisely to allow mechanical cultivation of the furrows without damaging the beds and plastic.

Organic strawberry farming can be a satisfying and lucrative process if you know how to do it well.

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As we all know, strawberries are tender fruit, so while picking strawberries one has to be careful how you handle them. Let’s find out some handy tips on how to pick strawberries.

Picking strawberries can be great fun and it’s something the whole family can do together. Kicking off this trend, plenty of strawberry farms have come up with ideas that not only promote tourism but also make for a fresh change. The official strawberry picking season is usually around the seasons beginning April to June. Picking can be done fore a maximum of 4-5 days into their picking season.

While one might think that picking strawberries is easy, you actually have to know how to do it cleanly and carefully so that you do not cause damage either to the plant or the fruit. If you are out picking strawberries in a farm ask the owners to guide you about the best way of avoiding injury to the plant. You should be careful so that your knees and feet do not cause damage to either the plants or the fruit on the edge.

While picking, remember not to throw the fruit into the basket. Strawberries are tender fruits and bruise easily if not kept with care. If you want to bring along your own container for picking strawberries, make sure that the container is not very deep. Heaping strawberries one on top of the other more than 5 inches deep can bruise the berries, which are at the bottom. Ideally you could use either metal oven pans or plastic dishpans, which are not more than 3 inch tall. Large pots are usually good for holding fruit since they have plenty of space.

You would be well advised to pick those fruits only which are fully ripe and evenly coloured. While picking strawberries do not pick a fruit that is half ripe or discoloured. Since the fruit will not ripe once plucked, it will be wasted if you pick such strawberries. For a basketful of good berries, be careful to pick the chicest ones which are bright and plump and look ripe. In order to search for the good and choicest of berries use your hands to part the leaves so that the hidden fruits can be harvested.
Few handy tips for picking strawberries-

– Identify the berry you want to pluck
– Part the leaves in a clean manner and hold them back so that you can make a neat cut
– Hold the stem a little above the berry between your forefinger and the thumbnail, now pull the berry with a twist, but be careful to be tender, do not use excessive force, this may lead to damage to the other fruits.
– Be careful that your hands touch only the berry you are plucking be careful not to bruise other fruits.
– Once the stem is broken about one-half inch from the berry, roll it you’re your palm.

While you can pick strawberries at any time of the day, it is best to do so when the weather is cool. The early morning or cloudy days are the best. The fruit might become soft and bruised if the weather is hot. Once you finish picking strawberries put them in the shade.

Besides being fun, picking strawberries can mean bringing home the choicest fruits and healthier ones too than the ones you buy from stores. Also you have the option of choosing from a wide range about which fruit you would like to pick. Often the flavour of the fruit depends on its ripeness as well as variety too.

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