Photo: Rox jobros1 — CC BY-SA 3.0 · source
Survives zone 6 through 9
Harvest calendar
Best planted in early spring after your last frost, or in fall before the ground freezes, depending on your climate.
A diminutive Himalayan alpine strawberry, just 4–6 cm tall, native to elevations of 2,000–3,600 m from Nepal and Sikkim to Tibet and northern Myanmar, distinguished by small pink-to-white fruit that's edible but essentially flavorless.
- Hardiness
- Zone 6–9
- Habit
- Groundcover
- Edible part
- Fruit
- Ripens
- Summer–autumn
- Mature size
- Low rosette 5–10 cm, spreading by slender runners
- Light
- Partial shade
- Soil pH
- 6.0–7.0 (near-neutral)
- Environment
- Montane
- Native range
- The Himalaya (Kumaun to Sikkim), Tibet, and northern Myanmar, typically at 2,000–3,600 m, in forests, shrubberies, shady banks and mountain-top thickets and meadows.
- Status
- Wild
- Years to fruit
- 2–4 yrs
- Growth speed
- Slow to establish as a seedling, then spreads and grows rapidly via stolons.
- Spacing
- 25 cm (10 in) apart — about 16 per m² (15 per 10 sq ft)
- Leaf shape
- Trifoliate leaves with oblong to ovate leaflets roughly 1–2.5 cm, on slender, mostly hairless stems.
- Root system
- Shallow and fibrous from a short woody crown, almost all of it in the top 15–30 cm, with new roots striking down wherever a runner touches soil. Nothing to dig around: the crown must sit at soil level, buried too deep it rots and planted too high it dries out.
- Fruit description
- Small, pink-to-white, globose fruit up to about 25 × 15 mm; edible raw but essentially flavorless.
- Propagation
- By seed, sown in early spring under glass (four or more weeks to germinate), or by division of runners, ideally in mid-summer for establishment by the following season.
- Pollination
- Hermaphrodite, insect-pollinated flowers.
The edible parts listed above are a starting point, not a field guide. Identify a plant with certainty — ideally against a local authority — before eating any part of it, and read the full disclaimer. Spotted something wrong? Report it.
Growing guide
Fertilizing. Prefers fertile, well-drained, moisture-retentive soil in a sunny position; tolerates part shade but with reduced fruiting.
How it spreads. A vigorous, rapidly spreading ground cover — prostrate stolons emerge from leaf axils and root readily, quickly forming colonies.
Growing tips. Native to cool, high-elevation Himalayan forest and shrubland habitat (2,000–3,600 m); seedlings start slowly but growth accelerates once established.
Grow journal
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