Strawberry Plants Not Fruiting: Causes by Symptom and Fixes

Why Strawberry Plants Are Not Fruiting

Strawberry plants that are not fruiting fall into three groups, and the group tells you the cause. Plants with no flowers at all are too young, too shaded, too crowded, too old, or lost their buds over winter. Plants that flowered and set nothing were hit by frost below 32°F or root trouble. Plants with small, lumpy berries were poorly pollinated. Find your row in the table, then read the matching section.

What you see	Most likely cause	Fix
Planted this spring, few or no berries	First-year plants, blossoms removed or should be	Wait. Full crop comes next year
Healthy leaves, no flowers, less than 8 hours of sun	Shade	Move the bed or clear what shades it
Dense mat of plants, few flowers, small berries	Crowding from runners, or a bed past three years	Renovate after harvest, or replant
No flowers after a hard winter without mulch	Flower buds injured below 15°F	Straw mulch in late fall
Flowers after a cold night, no berries	Spring frost on open blossoms	Cover on nights below 32°F
Small, misshapen berries with uneven seeds	Poor pollination	Take covers off by day during bloom
Day-neutral type stops in midsummer	Heat above 85°F	Wait for cooler weather
Weak flower stalks, no fruit, in a wet spot	Root rot	Check roots, improve drainage

First-Year Plants Are Not Supposed to Fruit

If the bed went in this spring, an empty June is the plan working. Iowa State University Extension is direct about it: during the first growing season, all blossoms should be removed from June-bearing strawberries, weekly, until early July. Letting them fruit reduces plant establishment, runner development and next season’s yield.

Day-neutral and everbearing types follow a shorter version. Remove all blossoms until early July, then let later flowers develop. The first harvest comes in August and continues until frost. Rutgers gives the same advice as a six week period of flower removal after planting.

If you did not know which kind you bought, June-bearing vs. everbearing strawberries explains how the types differ in when they flower.

Leaves but No Flowers: Sun, Crowding and Bed Age

A second-year or older plant that makes plenty of leaves and no flower stalks is missing something it needed last year, when the buds were laid down.

Sun. Rutgers describes the right site as full sun all day, or at least 8 hours. A bed planted in the open can lose that as nearby trees and shrubs grow, so count the hours of direct light in June before blaming anything else.

Crowding. Runners fill a bed quickly. South Dakota State University Extension warns that when a planting becomes too dense, berry size and yield fall and disease becomes a problem. The targets from Ohio State are rows 18 to 24 inches wide by August, with plants 6 to 8 inches apart in the row. At renovation, South Dakota State restores the row to 12 to 18 inches and removes stray plants, and Rutgers narrows it to 12 inches.

Age. Strawberry beds wear out. Rutgers advises fruiting the same planting for no more than three years to keep production and quality. Clemson allows two, or possibly three to four, fruiting seasons where weeds, diseases and insects stay under control. A bed in its fifth summer that has gone quiet needs replacing with new plants.

Renovation is the fix for the first two and the delay for the third. Right after the June harvest, narrow the rows, take out the oldest plants, fertilize and water. Ohio State says June-bearing beds should be renovated every year right after harvest for good production beyond one season.

Next Year’s Berries Are Made in Fall

June-bearing strawberries are short-day plants. The University of Wisconsin fruit program explains that as day length falls below 13 hours and temperatures cool, they begin forming the flower buds for the following year’s crop. Clemson puts the window at late August, September and early October. Whatever happens to the plants in those weeks shows up the next June, long after the cause is forgotten.

That makes late summer the most important care period in the strawberry year. Strawberries need 1 to 1.5 inches of water per week, and Clemson lists the bud-forming weeks among the critical times for it. South Dakota State singles out August, during runner development.

Fertilizer timing follows the same logic. Rutgers recommends 5-10-10 at 2 pounds per 100 square feet at renovation and again in mid-August. Up to 1 pound of actual nitrogen per 100 feet of row, which is 10 pounds of 10-10-10, can go on at renovation to promote runners. South Dakota State advises against nitrogen earlier in spring, since it can soften fruit and increase disease. Feeding in spring cannot add flowers to this year’s crop either, because those buds were formed the previous fall.

The buds then have to survive winter. They can be injured below 15°F, so cold-climate beds need straw. Apply it once the soil stays below 40°F and the crowns are dormant. Ohio State’s dates are November 15 to 30, and no later than December 15, at 2 to 3 inches deep. Rutgers uses 4 inches in early to mid-December. In spring, South Dakota State says to pull the straw back once temperatures stay above 20°F, before the leaves under it begin to yellow.

Flowers but No Berries: Frost and Root Trouble

When the plants bloomed and the flowers came to nothing, look at the timing of the last cold night. Strawberry flower buds are very susceptible to spring frosts, and open blossoms are sensitive to any temperature below freezing. The threshold that matters is 32°F on a night when blossoms are open.

Rutgers advises covering the bed before any night when open blooms will see temperatures under 32°F. Take the cover off again in the morning so pollinators can reach the flowers.

Root problems give a similar result with a different look. University of Maine Cooperative Extension describes plants with root rot as forming frail-looking fruit trusses and no fruit, and suggests checking whether that part of the bed is wetter than the rest. Strawberries want good drainage and a soil pH of 6.0 to 6.5. If only the low end of the row fails, dig a plant and inspect the roots before replanting there.

Small or Misshapen Berries: Pollination

Flowers that set only small, lumpy fruit were not fully pollinated. NC State Extension states that in spring and early summer, misshapen strawberries are almost always due to poor pollination, and gives a simple test. Look at the seeds on the surface. Large seeds were pollinated and small ones were not, so a poorly pollinated berry has seeds of mixed sizes.

Poor pollination is common in two situations: when plants have been under row covers during bloom, and when the bloom period has been rainy or cold. Strawberry flowers are self-fertile, as explained in self-pollinating vs. cross-pollinating fruit, but pollen still has to reach every part of the flower for the berry to fill out evenly.

The fix follows from those two situations. Take frost covers off every morning once flowers open, and keep them off through the day. A rainy, cold bloom is weather, and there is nothing in the bed to correct afterward. NC State adds that lygus bugs can also deform berries, but seeds on that fruit are similar in size, and the insects are rarely numerous until late in the season.

Day-Neutral Plants That Stop in Summer

Day-neutral strawberries fruit from summer into fall, with a gap that surprises many growers. South Dakota State notes that they do not form flower buds at temperatures above 85°F, so they tend to stop producing during midsummer heat. Nothing is wrong with the plants. Keep them watered at about 1 inch per week, and expect picking to resume as the weather cools and continue until frost.

What to Do Now for Fruit Next Year

1. Right after harvest, renovate: narrow rows to 12 to 18 inches and remove the oldest plants.
2. Fertilize at renovation and again in mid-August, and skip spring nitrogen.
3. Water 1 to 1.5 inches per week through early October while buds form.
4. Mulch with 2 to 4 inches of straw once the soil stays below 40°F.
5. Cover open blossoms on spring nights below 32°F, and uncover them by day.
6. Replace the bed after about three fruiting years.