Kitchen Garden Forum

Otherwise, like me, you will find yourself trying to figure out which ones are which before you get to plant them out!

I have several varieties of strawberries, in varying numbers. Some are labelled: Malling centenary (3 plants), vibrant (approx 9), mara des bois (12-ish). I also have hapil, which I collected runners from last year and these are mixed with ciflorette, that I also collected runners from. In theory, they are very different berries and I should be able to tell them apart from the shape and colour of the fruit as well as the reflex sepals that is characteristic of a gariguette type strawberry. Note the 'in theory' part. I want to keep them apart so that I can plant them out in their own beds when I get to that stage.

Watch this space for results!

Good advice. I have a strawberry border and replaced several plants a few years ago. You think you will remember which are which but you never do and come the end of the season when very long runners start making an appearance and intruding on the other variety's territory it's only too easy to find you have lost track.
Of course some varieties do look rather different or are of different sizes but you can't always take that for granted.

I,ve just made the same mistake planting out my tomato plants and can,t remember now which is which. Cropping this year will be a wait and see exercise unless we have blight in which case some plants may prove slightly more resistant than others......although I'm not betting on it!

Thanks to the cats I have problems every year with labels & brassica's are undistinguishable when little but will something of that family - let's hope grown far enough apart! I grew my original strawberries in nice neat rows, labels now gone & not the cats just deteriorated. The only ones I can recognise are the pink flowered ones, but frankly can't taste much difference in any of them, it is just size & shape !

Labelling is a pain, the ink fades/disappear or birds/wind pulls them out the ground.

I am even doing a site map of what is planted where but know latter on in the year I will lose interest in it and just enjoy the produce

I use a hand held label printer ,I print the plant name and stick it to a plastic marker they last for around two years

I rub a wet finger over the plastic label then use a HB pencil. This seems to work best and can be rubbed out with a soft rubber and reused.

I've taken to using an indelible felt pen, such as a sharpie. I've found that most of the cheap plastic stick labels become brittle after a year, which is really annoying as I'd like to re-use them, but they snap in my hand. If they do last longer, a bit of meths does the job to clean off the old writing. What? Doesn't everyone keep a bottle of meths handy in the potting shed?

I find cider nicer tasting

robo!