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I remember walking around the perimeter of our old fence twenty years ago with Marshall our black lab  and stumbling upon a few wild strawberry plants hidden away in the corner, the next day when I checked on the strawberries, they were gone, most likely eaten by squirrels or birds. Fast forward a few years, we put up a new fence, this time along the entire perimeter of the property, all thoughts of wild strawberries gone from my mind because I never saw them again or more accurately I never looked for them again, not until three or four years ago when I found a few in the corner of one of my gardens near the pool.

This year, the wild strawberry plants are everywhere, in the back and the front yard. What surprises me at this point is not only are they are still producing fruit this late in the strawberry season, but that the birds and the critters have left them alone for us to pick them.

What’s interesting is that this year, their proliferation could almost be compared to that of a weed, similar to my annual foe, the bishop’s weed. The wild strawberries are spreading themselves in and among my perennials like the lavender in the first two pictures, their saving grace however, lies in the shallow nature of their root system, very easy to dig up as opposed to the nightmare of the bishop’s weed root system, something I have to contend with big time next spring. My bishop’s weed also exploded on the scene this year, so my work is more than cut out for me, come next year, not looking forward to that I can promise you.