Brandon Family Farm focuses on organic strawberries

Alby and Heather Brandon own and operate Brandon Family Farm in West Kingston, RI. It’s a certified organic diversified vegetable farm with about 15 acres in production. About 10 years ago, they added strawberries to their crop rotation. The strawberries are sold through farmers markets, a CSA program and a U-pick.

Establishing

Northeast strawberry producers generally select between two production methods: matted row and plasticulture. The Brandons used the matted row method when they started with strawberries, planting June-bearing bareroot plants 18 – 24 inches apart in rows five feet on center. They employed a two-year production cycle.

In year one – the growth year – they kept the beds as weed-free as possible and tried to reduce the runners to three to four per plant. Year two was the fruiting year, and in late June, after the crop was harvested, they would till the beds and rotate back into vegetable production for the next three years.

The matted row system was an easy entry point to strawberry production because it’s relatively low cost, said Alby, but the beds tend to become a “tangle of plants, and they really compete with themselves more than anything. And so that leads to lower yields because you’re kind of crowding the bed.” Often, matted row systems only produce ripe fruit on the edges of the bed.

He has transitioned to a plasticulture system, planting plugs 12 inches apart in threefoot- wide beds covered with black plastic mulch. Plugs are more vigorous, allowing a later planting date. Bare-root plants need to be planted by the end of July at the latest, but with the plugs, he has planted as late as early September. A later planting date means he can get a spring vegetable crop into the strawberry field, like brassicas, lettuce or salad greens.

Alby cautioned against overfertilizing before planting strawberries; they don’t need as much fertility as vegetable crops. When he does use fertilizer, he uses an organic 7-1-7 blend at a quarter to half the amount vegetables typically require.

Year one is still a growth year in the plasticulture system, but all the runners are removed from the plants. Weed control is easier with this system, although it can be difficult to keep the edges of the plastic clear. They use the fingerweeder on their K.U.L.T.-Kress cultivator to manage the weeds, and then typically plant an oat cover crop in mid-September between the beds.

Year two is the production year, with this system yielding higher fruit production because the robust plug-grown plants have less competition and more sunlight. Favorite varieties include ‘Flavorfest,’ ‘Galleta,’ ‘Sonata’ and ‘Jewel.’

Tending

In December, after the plants become dormant, Alby covers the plants with purchased straw applied with a PTO-powered shredder. He prefers straw mulch because it creates the classic strawberry field appearance and offers soft padding for harvesters who need to kneel when picking. The straw is removed in early spring. By May, the plants begin to bloom, marking a susceptible period for the cold-sensitive buds.

Alby said, “Almost every year we have to protect them from frost. You really have to pay attention because you can get these clear nights where you have ground frosts and the temperature might only be 38º.”

Because they grow strawberries in two locations, they have two systems for mitigating potential frost damage. One farm has plenty of water, so they use a sprinkler system (which requires 200 gallons/minute) to protect the flowering crop. They use large row covers to protect the crop at the other farm.

Alby prefers June-bearing strawberry plants over day-neutral varieties, which fruit over a longer period, because he finds the disease and pest pressure is minimal in spring. His primary problem is the fungal disease botrytis. He manages the botrytis with three sprayings of organic fungicides such as OSO and Serenade during the flowering stage. Botrytis has also been less of an issue with the plasticulture system because Alby said, “You have more airflow around the plants.”

Marketing

The majority of their crop is sold through their U-pick. According to Alby, adequate parking is the most critical safety consideration. Creating the 80 – 90 parking spaces they need has required taking land out of production. The other infrastructure they use is simple: a portable tent, a portable toilet and a hand-washing station. He also recommended a source of drinking water and making sure that the farm has an insurance policy that includes agritourism. He finds that compared to having the crew pick berries, the U-pick is labor efficient, requiring only one or two people to manage the scales and payment while hundreds of customers do the harvesting. If anything, U-pick customers are more accepting of slightly blemished berries than discerning retail customers. They don’t spend much time worrying about how many berries customers eat in the field.

Adding strawberries to their production system, especially the U-pick, has also improved the overall visibility of the farm.

Alby said, “We really were able to grow our email list when we started growing strawberries because they are so popular. A lot of people that maybe are not as dedicated to buying local produce will still come to do strawberries, so then you kind of get them to drive some interest in your farm.”

by Sonja Heyck-Merlin