The Best Times to Cut & Plant My Strawberry Plugs

Summer

• The time to plant strawberry plugs is before the weather gets too hot. Typically, this is in the summer after the mother plants have grown for a couple of months. The plants put out a flush of leaves in the early spring and then send out runners about the same time as the blossoms come out in early June or when the soil nears 70 degrees Fahrenheit.

Maturity Level

• Strawberry plugs need to be mature enough to pull their own nutrients from the soil before you cut them from the mother plant. The runners develop root buds quickly, especially if you remove any blossoms from the mother plant. Once the roots are extending into the soil and new leaves are forming, cut the runners from the mother plant and transplant them at the same depth.

Greenhouse Planting

• Greenhouse strawberry plants are not limited by weather outdoors. Potentially, you could encourage the mother plant to produce runners in the winter by removing the blossoms and keeping them in the sunlight with a temperature between 60 and 75 F. Transplant the runners into separate plant pots to grow until the chance of frost is over.

Fall

• Although most growers plant strawberry plugs in the early summer, you can plant the plugs in the fall if you have mild winters where the temperatures don't go far below freezing. A few weeks of growing in good moist soil is enough time for the roots to establish the plants before they go dormant until spring.