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- Author or Editor: Jayesh B. Samtani x
Strawberries (Fragaria ×ananassa) are one of the major high-value crops in North America. There is increasing interest in commercial strawberry production for local markets in Virginia and surrounding states, but information on the performance of newer cultivars is extremely limited. We tested 10 commercially available June-bearing cultivars [Benicia, Camarosa, Camino Real, Chandler, Strawberry Festival, Flavorfest, FL Radiance, Treasure, Sweet Charlie, and Winterstar™ (FL 05-107)] and two day-neutral cultivars (Albion and San Andreas) for their spring and summer fruiting capacity in Virginia production systems in a randomized, replicated study, at three on-farm locations. Data were collected on vegetative growth, yield performance, fruit quality, sweetness, and fruit diameter. Cultivars with the highest total yields averaged across all three locations were Benicia, Camino Real, Chandler, and Camarosa. ‘Camino Real’ had the highest marketable yield at all three locations, not significantly different from ‘Chandler’, and ‘Benicia’ and ‘Camarosa’ had the highest marketable yield at two of the three locations. ‘Flavorfest’ and ‘Sweet Charlie’ had the highest total soluble solids concentration for the harvest season. Overall, for all locations, ‘Benicia’ and ‘Camino Real’ had the largest fruit diameter, and ‘Strawberry Festival’ had the smallest fruit diameter.
Strawberry (Fragaria ×ananassa) production practices followed by growers in the United States vary by region. Understanding the challenges, needs, and opportunities in each region is essential to guide research, policy, and marketing strategies for the strawberry industry across the country, and to enable the development of general and region-specific educational and production tools. This review divided the United States into eight distinct geographic regions and an indoor controlled or protected environment production system. Current production systems, markets, cultivars, trends, and future directions for each region are discussed. A common trend across all regions is the increasing use of protected culture strawberry production with both day-neutral and short-day cultivars for season extension to meet consumer demand for year-round availability. All regions experience challenges with pests and obtaining adequate harvest labor. Increasing consumer demand for berries, climate change-induced weather variability, high pesticide use, labor and immigration policies, and land availability impact regional production, thus facilitating the adoption of new technologies such as robotics and network communications to assist with strawberry harvesting in open-field production and production under controlled-environment agriculture and protected culture.