Soft Fruit (Berries)
Starting with 2017, each year we add several thousand berry plants to our farm until we reach full production. We're starting with strawberries, then moving into cane fruit (raspberries, blackberries), blueberries, and less common soft fruit including currants, lingonberries, and many others. We will offer a lot of different varieties within each type of fruit as well as jams, jellies, syrups, sauces, ice creams, and other fruit-based products.
Strawberries & Pineberries
2017 Strawberry Varieties
Mara Des Bois - this small to medium berry grows throughout the summer and has the highest flavor and fragrance of any everbearer. It is a French specialty variety with exceptionally high taste and fragrance. This is the strawberry used primarily in our ice creams.
Seascape - these large berries are produced all summer long and has excellent flavor and size when picked ripe from the plant. Excellent flavor, good for freezing.
2018 Strawberry & Pineberry Varieties
We will offer the same varieties as 2017, plus the following June-bearing varieties:
Earliglow - June-bearing small to medium berry with excellent freezing and flavor.
Cavendish - ripening after earliglow, these are large berries also with excellent freezing and flavor qualities.
Jewel - ripening after Cavendish, Jewel is a top seller with subperb flavor and freezing qualities.
Sonata - ripens with Jewel producing large conical fruit with excellent flavor and good freezing qualities.
Sparkle - ripening next, these small to medium fruit produce dark red berries with excellent flavor and freezing qualities.
Malwina - our latest June-bearing variety has large berries and excellent flavor with good freezing qualities.
Natural Albino Pineberry (AKA Hula Berry - TM) - a Dutch variety of albino strawberry with white fruit, red seeds, nickel-sized berries (small fruit), distinctive flavor, and excellent aroma.
Mara Des Bois - this small to medium berry grows throughout the summer and has the highest flavor and fragrance of any everbearer. It is a French specialty variety with exceptionally high taste and fragrance. This is the strawberry used primarily in our ice creams.
Seascape - these large berries are produced all summer long and has excellent flavor and size when picked ripe from the plant. Excellent flavor, good for freezing.
2018 Strawberry & Pineberry Varieties
We will offer the same varieties as 2017, plus the following June-bearing varieties:
Earliglow - June-bearing small to medium berry with excellent freezing and flavor.
Cavendish - ripening after earliglow, these are large berries also with excellent freezing and flavor qualities.
Jewel - ripening after Cavendish, Jewel is a top seller with subperb flavor and freezing qualities.
Sonata - ripens with Jewel producing large conical fruit with excellent flavor and good freezing qualities.
Sparkle - ripening next, these small to medium fruit produce dark red berries with excellent flavor and freezing qualities.
Malwina - our latest June-bearing variety has large berries and excellent flavor with good freezing qualities.
Natural Albino Pineberry (AKA Hula Berry - TM) - a Dutch variety of albino strawberry with white fruit, red seeds, nickel-sized berries (small fruit), distinctive flavor, and excellent aroma.
Strawberry Plant Care
What do we apply to our strawberries? Before planting, strawberries are going in where native plants and noxious weeds have grown. We till up the soil repeatedly then apply compost we make from our own livestock manure, livestock bedding (wheat and bluegrass straw), and spilled feed hay. We till in the compost, mound it up, and plant the strawberries. So far, we have not been applying plastic as we allow our strawberries to send out runners. We have not applied any fertilizers or sprays, though we will update this posting if we do. The only things we add are water, straw in the winter, and light compost, if needed.
