One of our early winter jobs is always to mulch the strawberries so they over winter well. The mulch keeps the ground from freezing and thawing so the shallow roots of the strawberry plants don’t get broken off. It also holds the plants back a bit in the spring. If they grow and bloom too early the blossoms often get frozen by a late frost, hence no fruit. We usually wait to uncover the plants until it is so warm that they have started to grow under the mulch (that we don’t want either)…then the mulch goes between the rows to keep the weeds down and keep the berries clean of mud when it rains. It also makes the ground softer for kneeling on. We have put electric fence around the strawberry bed to keep the deer from grazing on the strawberry leaves. In the past few years they have developed a taste for strawberries. We are hoping the fence will be enough of a deterrent to keep them out.