14 May 2012

Urban Farming - Cinder Block Strawberries

 The kids and I went strawberry picking with cousins this morning.  We went to our favorite local orchard and had a great time.  My kids always pick tons of strawberries!

As fun as it was and as much as I love supporting local small farms, I can't wait until we have our own productive strawberry patch!  I am sure we will always go to the orchard for large quantities to put up for the winter, but we look forward to our little patch producing.


We have a total of 12 strawberry plants right now (I only had six, but last night when I came home from our Mother's Day picnic, there were six more on my backyard table!  Thanks to my wonderful neighbors for plants AND garden planning!).  I planted a few in the sunny front yard, but the remaining are in the "Cinder Block Strawberry Patch" in our side yard.  Our driveway is separated from the neighboring  apartments by a beat up row of cinder blocks.  In an effort to beautify and produce, we are planting strawberries in the hole of the cinder blocks.  I am setting plants in about every third hole and filling the remaining holes with soil and compost.  Strawberries send out shoots and grow new plants, so we are hoping that the blocks will one day be filled in with many beautiful strawberry plants!


2 comments:

Anne said...

Love it!!! Great idea!

Sarah said...

Anne- This is where I admit that NONE of this is my idea! My neighbor is studying permaculture at IU and when he comes home, he attacks my backyard like a madman. These have all been his ideas! I plan to do a few more "Urban Farming" blog post, simply because I LOVE this concept of growing food on such a small bit of land.