Jun 9, 2013

Easy Strawberry Cage

This year I would actually like to get some strawberries out of my garden. Up until this point most of the strawberries have been eaten by the birds. When I planted them, the plants were spread out to give them room to grow so it wasn't easy having a strong net system over them. When I did spread a net over them, the birds seemed to get caught in the netting half the time and I'd have to free them... to live another day to eat the fruits of my labor. Therefore, this year one of the things on my to-do list was to make a cage/enclosure to keep the birds out. Mission accomplished! I replanted the strawberries close together, which also makes for less weeding and put together my net system. It's not too big so it's easy to lift up when I need to do some harvesting.

Simple - 1" x 3"s attached in a 7' x 2' 1/2" frame, with a 1" x 1" center support
Corners screwed together (not nailed) for better, longer lasting support
I applied a layer of ext. paint from a can I had laying around to weatherproof it
Picked up a roll of 1/2" water tubing to support the net
Cut and attached the tubes with 1/2" copper pipe clamps
Nailed in some garden netting after fitting it over the tubes