But a huge amount of the ripe strawberries were lost to slugs due to holes being eaten in the berries. I had to pick near ripened strawberries to save them from the slugs, losing flavour before the strawberry could ripen. A month ago I decided to beat the slugs by creating protective ‘strawberry bags’ made from organza material which I sewed myself. The colour of the fabric chosen was blue – being the closest colour that chemical companies use for their snail bait and cutworm bait that helps prevent birds eating the bait.
I had an instant 100% success rate after fitting these protective bags over the strawberries, with subsequent beautiful and tasty, fully ripened strawberries.I hope to harvest strawberries nearly year-round here in Pinetown KZN, and I will report back to you how far the strawberry production cycle will stretch. Another strange occurrence as a result of placing strawberries in these bags was that the heat created ripened the strawberries in days, resulting in a strawberry more than double the normal size.
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