Strawberry Tower

Tower

If you have a lot of stawberries around, a strawberry tower is a good way to save space and get fruit.   Try making one in early spring with your stawberries plants.  This how-to will show you:

  1. materials needed
  2. pitfalls to avoid
  3. procedure to follow
  4. conclusion

Materials

materials
materials

To build your strawberry tower you’ll need:

  • 1 PVC pipe
  • an electric drill
  • gloves
  • 4 bags of dirt
  • shovel
  • 1 sheet of wire mesh

You’ll also course need a pile of strawberry plants like below.

pile of strawberries
pile of strawberries

Pitfalls

Don’t make these mistakes:

  • Using a pot – dirt spilling from the tower  fills the pot making it heavy and wasting dirt.
  • Not implanting a watering pipe – water runs off the vertical tower.
  • Using too few strawberries – pack them in.
  • Too much shade- strawberries like lots of  sun.

Procedure

To build your strawberry tower follow these steps.

Step 1: Foundation

holewire-in-hole-vert

First, let’s start laying the foundation of the tower.  We’ll need to dig a hole to keep the wire mess erect.

  1. Grab the wire mesh.
  2. Bend the mesh into a tube.
  3. Pick up the shovel.
  4. Dig a hole wide enough for your mesh tube.
  5. Stick your mesh tube into the hole.

Step 2: Filling with dirt.

water-pipe

Second, we’ll fill our mesh tube with dirt while making the resulting tower easy to water.  We’ll use the PVC pipe as a way of watering the tower.  It’ll be filled  around and stick out the middle of the dirt tower like shown above.

  1. Gather the PVC pipe and electric drill.
  2. Lay the PVC pipe down on a flat surface.
  3. Drill holes every couple inches.
  4. Stick the PVC pipe into the middle of the mesh tube.
  5. Push the PVC pipe firmly down into the ground.
  6. Grab your bags of dirt.
  7. Pick up your shovel.
  8. Fill the mesh to the top with the dirt using the shovel.

Step 3: Planting the  strawberries.

first-row

Third, now we have a dirt tower.  We just need to plant the strawberries.

  1. Put your gloves on.
  2. Start at the bottom.
  3. Make a hole the dirt inside a hole in the mesh.
  4. Grab a strawberry plant and stick it’s roots into the hole.
  5. Push the dirt down from above in the tower, letting it fill your hole.
  6. Leave the hole made by pushing the dirt down.
  7. Grab another strawberry.
  8. Plant it in that hole where the dirt fell down to your first strawberry.
  9. Push again down the dirt from above to plant the strawberry.
  10. Repeat numbers 5 through 8 until you reach the top.
  11. Do this again an again until you plant all your strawberries.

Conclusion

Tower

Now, you have a strawberry tower.  You’ve dug a hole, put a mesh tube in it, stuck a PVC pipe down the middle, filled it all with dirt, and lined the sides with strawberries.  With a temperate weather and good sun, you’ll have a nice crop of juicy red strawberries.