Phenotypic characterization of a strawberry (Fragaria ×ananassa Duchesne ex Rosier) diversity collection

Authors: HUMMER, KIM - Former ARS Employee; Bassil, Nahla; ZURN, JASON - Kansas State University; AMYOTTE, BEATRICE - Agriculture And Agri-Food Canada

Submitted to: Plants, People, Planet
Publication Type: Peer Reviewed Journal
Publication Acceptance Date: 7/29/2022
Publication Date: 9/13/2022
Citation: Hummer, K., Bassil, N.V., Zurn, J., Amyotte, B. 2022. Phenotypic characterization of a strawberry (Fragaria ×ananassa Duchesne ex Rosier) diversity collection. Plants, People, Planet. 5(2):209-224. https://doi.org/10.1002/ppp3.10316.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/ppp3.10316

Interpretive Summary: To secure a stable and safe food supply, the future of humanity will depend on the recognition, conservation, and application of the vast diversity available within cultivated types as well as crop wild species relatives. The strawberry is one of the most widely produced and consumed fruits worldwide and provides significant nutritional value. In 2019, the annual world production was 14.5 MT. Here, we characterize key agricultural traits in a diverse collection of heritage strawberries to provide background information for future berry breeding and improvement. The gene pool of many breeding programs over the past decades tended to include a reliable but limited set of well-known cultivars or newest releases. The traits of lesser-known heritage strawberry cultivars and selections examined by our study could be of value in expanding genepools by tapping into existing cultivated genetic diversity.

Technical Abstract: • Here we present a comprehensive evaluation of strawberry diversity through phenotyping 284 strawberry cultivars from collection of the US Department of Agriculture, National Clonal Germplasm Repository Corvallis. • We assessed 284 cultivars in 2019 and 2020 for quantified variation across 16 traits, including phenology, plant morphology, and fruit quality traits at full ripeness. • We observed that this strawberry diversity panel displayed a wide range of phenotypic variation that could prove useful for future strawberry improvement. For example, a second-year, field-grown strawberry plant can produce up to 121 meters of runners, on average, as many as 212 runners, and as many as 350 daughters per crown by the end of the first week in July in Corvallis, Oregon. Strawberry cultivar fruit can differ by 555-fold in weight, 3.5-fold in acidity, and; 827-fold in total anthocyanins. • ORUS 2427-1, NW 90054-37, and ‘Independence’, each selected or released from the Oregon USDA (ORUS) breeding program, proved to have a combination of the highest fruit quality traits. ‘Independence’ also had a high number of runner length and number of daughter plants. • Two California cultivars, ‘Oso Grande’, and ‘Cuesta’, and the Oregon cultivar ‘Pinnacle’, had the shortest time to ripen, 35 days in 2019, and 43 days in 2020, in the study group.