strawberries (everbearing)-healthy plants but why no berries

This is a wonderful forum! I'm a beginner and did a stupid thing. I planted strawberry plants (everbearing) in composted cow manure that we scraped out of our cow pasture. The plants are very healthy looking and putting out LOTS of runners but no flowers/berries. Is this too much nitrogen? Does anyone have any suggestions on how to fix it without taking out the plants? I guess they need more phosphorus. I do have superphosphate but the soil is hardly visible because of all the plants. Maybe some kind of liquid fertilizer? Thanks!

It very probably is too much nitrogen. It's doubtful they will produce berries this late in the year. But, if it's excess nitrogen, it will be depleted by next year and your plants should put on berries. If the plants look healthy right now, I wouldn't add anymore fertilizer.

I'm having the same problem with my strawberries. I transplanted them to a wide row in the garden when they were barely big enough to see. They are huge now and have lots of runners, but no berries.

We had been gone for over 2 years and the strawberry bed was weed infested. So, I cleared the wide row and moved them. Nothing but weeds had been in the row for 2 years and had okra the year before that.

Robin

I'd guess that the plants are really happy in the composted cow manure, but it's just not the right time of the year for them to bloom/make fruit. It's my understanding that the term 'everbearing' is a misnomer. They make fruit in the spring and then again in the fall but not really all the time as you might think by the term 'ever-bearing'.

My 'Ozark Beauty' everbearers were planted last winter, made fruit this spring and then went into plant growth mode with foliage and runners. They didn't make any fruit after that but that's mainly because deer ate them to the ground....

Jeff

I'm just really surprised mine didn't produce. I think there was 1 tiny green berry this spring. I planted the original plants 4 years ago and I know a lot of the plants are younger than that. The only thing I can think of is that we had a really warm spring, then 4 days of freezing temps, followed by a major heat wave and drought. Although I did water heavily 2 times a week. Hope they produce at least a few berries this fall!

It's been a long time since I grew strawberries so let me see if I can remember this right. They will produce a fair crop the first year and a real good crop the second year. By that time, the mother plant will be past it's prime. You should leave wide rows so that you can take some of those first year runners and peg them into the ground for a new row and let them become your new plants. Dig out the old ones after their second year of production and rework that row for future rows. As long as your plants are healthy, you will always have runners for new plants. Older plants will still produce but not nearly as well as new ones. It has been many years for me since I grew strawberries so I would run a search on the internet to get current info.

I think I did read somewhere that strawberrie plants do not do well past 2 years of age-just what Naturelover1950 said. That sounds like good advice about getting rid of the mother plant after the second year. Thanks for all that great help! -Trish