5 New Super Strawberries — All With Resistance To Fusarium Wilt
The University of California, Davis, is releasing five new strawberry varieties that are resistant to the soilborne disease Fusarium wilt, have high yields and improved fruit quality.
‘UC Eclipse’, ‘UC Golden Gate’, ‘UC Keystone’, ‘UC Monarch’, and ‘UC Surfline’ are available for sale to California nurseries from Foundation Plant Services.
Roughly 88% of strawberries grown in the nation come from California. Fusarium wilt is one of the most common reasons for crop loss and death, and yet 55% to 59% of cultivars planted in the state since 2014 have not been resistant, according to UC Davis research.
This is the first release from the UC Davis Strawberry Breeding Program where all the cultivars have Fusarium wilt resistance. They are meant to replace susceptible plants on the market such as ‘Monterey’, ‘UCD Royal Royce’, and ‘UCD Valiant’.
‘Monarch’ was also developed specifically as a prototype for mechanical harvesting — another first out of the breeding program, which dates to the 1930s and has released 72 patented cultivars over the decades.
“These provide the same yield or better and they are Fusarium resistant,” says Steve Knapp, a Distinguished Professor in the Department of Plant Sciences and director of the UC Davis Strawberry Breeding Program. “They have a better collection of traits. They’re superior.”
The new strawberry varieties each have improved flavor and characteristics that allow for near year-round growing around California, where about 1.8 billion pounds of the fruit are harvested each year. Some of the cultivars are adapted for production in the southern part of the state while others do well under the long daylight hours of summer along the coast.
UC Eclipse, a “summer plant” cultivar, has the potential to increase grower profitability as it produces in the fall and winter, and yields during research testing were 54% higher than similar cultivars.
“We expect this cultivar to have wide commercial appeal,” Knapp says.
‘UC Golden Gate’ and ‘UC Keystone’ are “day neutral.” Those type of cultivars grow throughout the summer on about 60% of strawberry farming acres in the state. The “short-day” plants ‘Surfline’ and ‘Monarch’ are resistant to Verticillium wilt and Phytophthora crown rot.
‘UC Surfline’ and ‘UC Eclipse’ are firmer and promise longer shelf lives. Monarch provides growers with improved fruit qualities relative to other mass-produced cultivars and has characteristics needed for advances in mechanical harvesting, Knapp adds.
For more, continue reading at Plantsciences.ucdavis.edu.
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