Active Versus Passive Winter Row Cover Management: Impacts on Strawberry Yields and Pests Inside High Tunnels

Growing fall-planted strawberries on plastic mulch in high tunnels is a promising strategy for strawberry production in Indiana. Despite previous success, the system faces challenges, including increased populations of soft-bodied insects such as twospotted spider mites (TSSMs) and aphids. Although using row covers for winter protection is a common practice in open-field plasticulture strawberry production in the region, the optimal use of row covers in the winter inside high tunnels remains unclear. To address this, three row cover management strategies—no cover (NC), active cover with hoops (AH), and passive cover with hoops (PH)—were applied during the winters of the 2021–22 and 2022–23 strawberry seasons in high tunnels in Vincennes, IN, USA. This study assessed strawberry yield and the population dynamics of TSSMs and aphids throughout the seasons. Although the row cover treatments created varying environmental conditions during the winter, no significant differences in strawberry yield were observed among the treatments in either season. Row covers increased temperatures, which facilitated the overwintering of TSSMs and created more favorable conditions for aphid reproduction, potentially leading to higher pest pressure and greater management challenges in the spring. Although the findings suggest that winter use of row covers did not provide significant benefits under the strawberry production system during the experimental years, they remain a valuable insurance measure during extremely cold conditions.