In April this small garden seems utterly dormant except for a slight and almost unnoticeable change in the strawberry leaves compared to that of their winter sleep.

Things will changed rapidly here as the rain and sun renew the earth’s plant growing habitat.  Come June and into July, this same 48 square foot patch will have been transformed into a beautiful and lush area of our property.  And it will be bearing a decent size strawberry harvest for our family.  Fresh strawberries on vanilla ice cream or heavy cream, and, of  course, fresh strawberry shortcake, fresh strawberry shortcake, and more fresh strawberry shortcake.  Did I mention fresh strawberry shortcake?  I’m drooling already – I think there’s a bit of Pavlov here.  This variety is unknown but comes from the remnants of a much larger strawberry patch where I grew up as a teen.  That patch was well establish for some time prior to 1973.  The berries here at my home are medium, sweet, and juicy when ripe.  We also have wild strawberries throughout our field which are much sweeter, are pea sized, and more time consuming to pick – worth the effort at the right time.  As I write this now, I’m thinking I have a 5,000 square foot section of field that is just waiting to be tilled and, and, and, wait for it – planted with strawberry, strawberry, and strawberry plants.  Now, just so that you know that I know, strawberries are indeed good for you.  But just like a lot of other food, don’t overdo it in a single serving – excessive strawberries do have negative effects, including stomach and intestinal pain, on some people.  Since I don’t seem to have that issue yet, I don’t follow this advice and will gladly eat your serving.  Hey plants … see you for strawberry picking in June!!

Update:

Here we are almost 2 weeks later and the life is picking up.  There are a few strawberry blossoms already if you look closely.

We’ve cleaned some weeds out of there and pruned a few plants back.  No worry, this patch will take off soon.