Actually, Keith and I just spoke on the phone on this issue but for others:

With soil solarization it is recommended to tightly cover your moist soil for at least 6 weeks in the summer months while the sun it almost directly overhead. Right under the sealed 1 mil plastic temps can reach 145F plus. My experience is that for every inch deeper you will lose about 6-7 degrees F. Pathogens and weed seeds succumb to prolonged temps of 95F and above.

1 mil plastic can be bought in 4' rolls on line. Perfect for covering raised beds.

Beneficials bounce back fast so not a worry. You will be amazed at the results. No weeds!

Thanks again Carl.

Keith

Carl,
You might know the answer to this.
Back about 1968 I picked strawberries in the Puyallup valley to make a little spending money; got paid 65 cents a flat -huge cannery flats- and we had to pick them stemless..
Those strawberries went straight to the packing plant a few miles away. Those berries were dark red all the way through, very sweet, and almost what I'd call a concentrated strawberry flavor when compared to the strawberries that you get nowadays.
Do you have any idea what the variety may have been, and where I can buy some plants?

Were you by chance working for Spooner farms? We used to buy all our strawberry plants from them. There were several cultivars being grown for cannery back then. Back then we grew a lot of Hoods and Northwests. I'm thinking that the Marshall was no longer being grown much because of its susceptibility to viruses.

Hoods would have been great flavor and very sweet. I'm thinking that was likely your berry unless it could have been Shuksan. I'll have to look up when Shuksan was first released. Very dark red and super concentrated flavor. Hood was red through and through but not the dark red of Shuksan. I know we grew Shuksan in the 70's but not sure when dad first planted that one.

If you can find either cultivar you will be extremely happy.

Update: Just looked it up, Shuksan was released from WSU in 1970. My bet it was you were picking Hoods in 1968.

PS: It appears you can buy plants from Scenic Hill Nursery in Albany, Oregon. If you do say hello to Larry from me.

^^^^^
Thanks, I'll see if I can find some Hoods.
Spooners was a few miles away, I picked for Mattlock's in Alderton, close to Orting. All those farms are pretty much gone now; what a shame.