ARS | Publication request: A Technique to Promote Fall Flowering in Short-Day Strawberry Varieties.

Submitted to: Southeast Strawberry Expo Proceedings
Publication Type: Proceedings
Publication Acceptance Date: October 30, 2006
Publication Date: November 9, 2006
Citation: Takeda, F. 2006. A technique to promote fall flowering in short-day strawberry varieties.. Southeast Strawberry Expo Proceedings. Pg. 19.

Technical Abstract: Short-day strawberry cultivars bloom in spring under mid-Atlantic coast growing conditions. Day-neutral varieties produce flowers from late summer to early winter, but fall flowering in short-day plants during that time is rare in this region. The intent of this presentation is to describe a new method of preparing strawberry transplants that will flower in fall and again in spring. This propagation technique is a simple approach to producing planting materials of short-day strawberry cultivars that will produce flower in fall and spring. We believe that horticultural production technologists will use these new findings to develop a production system in which fall and spring strawberry harvest (double-cropping) would be possible in short-day strawberry cultivars grown in high tunnels. There has been tremendous interest in North America, Europe, Japan, and elsewhere to develop cultural systems to improve "out-of-season" fruit production. Out-of-season fruit production is possible, in part, by using cultivars with different cropping season (short-day, everbearing, and day-neutral cultivars, sequential planting of cold-stored plants, by growing strawberries in greenhouses and plastic tunnels, and using "conditioned" transplants for quick flowering). There are many reports of "conditioning" plants for early flower induction by artificial manipulations of temperature and photoperiod. To our knowledge, our 2006 HortScience report was first to describe a novel concept that early or out-of-season flowering is possible in short-day strawberry varieties grown under mid-Atlantic coast conditions by simply advancing the time when the runner tips are plugged to produce containerized transplants. This propagation technique will permit varieties such as 'Camarosa', 'Sweet Charlie', and 'Carmine' to produce fruit in fall and again in spring.