Knitted 3-D, Porous Textile Cover to Enhance Strawberry Fruit Production and Prevent Insect Feeding

Plant covers offer a potential non-chemical strategy to reduce insect herbivory and protect plants from weather extremes. The first 3-D spacer fabric constructed as a crop cover in a tunnel field application in previous research from our laboratory increased cabbage vegetative growth 2.93-fold and was resistant to insect penetration. Whether this use will increase fruit production was not studied. Tunnel field studies were conducted here with strawberries since they grow over three seasons (Fall to Spring) and single-layer textiles are used as a cover to protect flowers and fruit from freezing. Covered strawberry plants yielded a 3.56-fold increase in harvestable fruits with the number and weight of fruit significantly higher than in uncovered plants. No differences in vegetative plant biomass were found. The 3-D spacer fabric did not elicit a shade avoidance response. Covering consistently increased temperature, but relative humidity was not affected between the covered and uncovered field plots. The fabric, although porous to air and water, demonstrated absolute aphid exclusion in lab bioassays. In preliminary studies, rhizosphere bacterial colony-forming units did not differ significantly between covered and uncovered plots. On-farm testing is now needed to examine the utility of this new textile for a variety of crop plants in different geographical locations.