How to make DIY multi-tiered strawberry beds

How to do it yourself

The simplest answer is to buy a ready-made structure from a specialized store. And if this is not possible, then build using virtually any available material: boards, boxes, pieces of slate, barrels, old furniture. Collecting a multi-tiered or vertical bed with your own hands is not so difficult. To make such a kind of pyramid, you do not need to have special training.

Before arranging multi-tiered beds, two questions need to be resolved - is there enough lighting for future plantings and how flat is the terrain of the site. Taking into account the second condition, a building level will be required for the arrangement. After marking the site for multi-tiered planting, it is necessary to level it. It is also possible that the first tier will need a solid brick foundation, which must be made on an already leveled site.

Description of construction

The shape of the structure can be very diverse - round, square, triangular. As a basic one, we will consider rectangular multi-tiered beds - they are easier to build and it will be easier to care for the plants. Regular strawberry beds are recommended to be oriented from east to west - for even lighting throughout the day. It is worth doing the same with multi-tiered.

The first step is to assemble the lower tier, securing the boards (other material) with nails or self-tapping screws. Keep in mind that the bottom tier is the largest. Each next one should be less (as it should be in the pyramid) by the width or two widths of the beds for the selected crop. In the case of strawberries, the recommended width is 40 cm, the same is the width of the tier, otherwise it will be difficult to care for the plants. The root system of strawberries goes into the soil by 10-30 cm, based on this, the height of the tier can be made at 30-40 cm.

At the bottom of the lower tier, you can lay a stainless steel mesh. Such a mesh with small cells will protect the roots from pests, but at the same time will allow soil microorganisms to creep into the garden and recycle humus.

There are recommendations to protect the bed with plastic wrap. In this case, water is well retained on the bed, which is useful when building beds in arid regions. However, strawberries love well-draining soils, so using sheeting in multi-tiered beds for this crop is not a good idea. To make a drainage layer, you need to pour sawdust or shavings, small branches, dry grass on the bottom of the tier.

At the bottom of the tier, you need to pour sawdust or shavings, small branches, dry grass. A layer of fertile soil with humus is poured on top. Each next tier is built in a similar way - mesh, sawdust, soil. In total, you can collect up to three or four tiers. The optimal height of a multi-tiered bed, which makes it easy to carry out all the necessary agrotechnical work, is about a meter.

An alternative type of multi-tiered strawberry beds, and in fact not quite a garden bed, is the cultivation of strawberries in boxes or pots fixed on special poles or even a fence, similar to decorative flowerpots. It is even easier to assemble such a structure with your own hands than a capital multi-tiered bed.The height of the growing containers should be about 20-40 cm. Drainage should be laid in the bottom of the pots, the pots should be filled with a mixture of soil, peat and humus, and watered as needed.

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Benefits of tiered growing

If you make a pyramid-shaped strawberry bed, you can very soon feel all its benefits. First of all - convenience for the gardener. Yes, at the very beginning you need to put more effort into arranging the garden, but then it will pay off handsomely when caring for strawberries - there will be no need to constantly bend over or work in a crooked position. So you can make your life much easier with your own hands. Further - saving the space of the site and growing more bushes in the same areas, which means getting large yields.

Better soil condition also. Firstly, due to several laying of a metal mesh, it is difficult for garden pests to access strawberry rhizomes. Secondly, when preparing the soil, weed roots are removed with our own hands, and to reduce the number of pathogenic microorganisms, the soil can be treated with boiling water or ignited. Thirdly, additional drainage is arranged in the beds, which is important for strawberries. Fourthly, the tiers are raised above the soil and warm up better.

Berries in such beds are much less in contact with the soil and therefore do not rot. In addition, there are special curly varieties of strawberries just for planting in multi-tiered or vertical beds. And finally, such a planting looks like a flower bed and is a wonderful decoration for a garden plot. So in a small area with your own hands, you can create both a garden bed and a flower bed at the same time. A bed-pyramid, covered with lush greenery until autumn, can become a decorative highlight of the site.

How to care for strawberries

In general, caring for strawberries in multi-tiered pyramid-shaped beds is similar to usual. The first thing to remember is the quality of the soil. Strawberries take root well and bear fruit on a variety of soils, excluding only too dense and moist, acidified or limestone soils. If you prepare the soil with your own hands, then to fill the multi-tiered beds, it is best to take a mixture of equal shares of turf, humus, peat and small sawdust.

At the same time, humus will give enough organic matter for fruiting. Sawdust will give the soil lightness. Peat retains moisture and slightly acidifies the soil (for strawberries, the optimal acidity level is 5-6 pH). Strawberry bushes are planted in layers from bottom to top. Pour about 0.5 liters of water into the hole, carefully level the roots, sprinkle the plant with earth, this must be done carefully, so that the root collar is at ground level.

The soil on multi-tiered beds dries out faster than on ordinary beds, therefore, at first, strawberries need to be watered at least once every three days. After the bushes have taken root, watering can be reduced, but the condition of the soil can be checked. In dry weather, it is recommended to dig plastic bottles with holes between the bushes, from which water will slowly seep to the roots, or to equip a drip irrigation system with your own hands.

In the first year, it is necessary to remove the mustache and single strawberry flowers. In the second and subsequent years, strawberries are fed before flowering. Mineral fertilizers are applied to the soil in liquid form along with irrigation. Feeding with organic fertilizers is carried out in the second and fourth years.

On fruiting bushes, you must regularly remove the mustache. After the end of the fruiting season, if you need seedlings for arranging a new strawberry with your own hands, you can leave up to three antennae on the bushes. On the eve of the first frost, all whiskers and all diseased or drying leaves should be removed on the strawberries. The first frosts make the strawberry shoots harder.But after the onset of cold weather, you need to think about wintering multi-tiered plantings.

The main difficulty here is to shelter them for the winter. It is clear that multi-tiered beds are better suited for southern regions with milder winters. In the northern regions, multi-tiered beds should be made small and mobile - in pots and boxes. With the first frost, they need to be removed to a frost-free, but cool room, for example, to a basement.

The capital bed can be insulated with dry straw or spruce branches, and additional agrofibre can be laid on the upper tiers. However, there is an easier way - to choose for arranging multi-tiered plantings of strawberries with your own hands those varieties that bear fruit well in the first year and update the plantings every year. So you can make a pyramid bed and grow strawberries on it as an annual plant.

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