In the early 1700s the Woodland Strawberry (vesca) was the widely cultivated DNA, but in 1714 a French officer, hiding his identity, visited Chile and sent back military information and 5 specimens of our native Beach or West Coast Strawberry (chiloensis). The chance crossing of latter species with the Virginia (the 3rd, also a native) in Brest and Cherbourg, followed by a
French botanist’s research, created the fruit we harvest commercially today. Both parent plants are native to Cascadia, along with the Woodland Strawberry. We have covered native strawberries in another lesson, but this “native cross” was a bit of a novelty in pioneer times. Great interest existed in exploring their commercial prospects. When this writer was a boy the 7,000 acres on the hills to the east of the Farm (around what is now the Pilchuck Glass School) held strawberry fields. The field on which the Living History Farm stood across from the old church held strawberries. Haida from Vancouver Island were bused down to pick the berries. All now forgotten … almost
https://appvoices.org/2002/06/01/2917/
http://naeb.brit.org/uses/search/?string=fragaria
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4117466/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a4Go05YYS7s
https://www.portlandnursery.com/natives/fragaria
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fragaria_vesca#/media/File:Illustration_Fragaria_vesca0.jpg
https://www.plc215.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/Kiosk-06.pdf
https://www.uvm.edu/vtvegandberry/factsheets/strawberryhistory.html
https://cms.agr.wa.gov/WSDAKentico/Imported/WashingtonsCentennialFarms-BW-Web.pdf
There are 3 species of native strawberries in Cascadia (from San Francisco to Alaska, west of the Cascade Crest. The one not an ancestor of today’s commercial strawberry is the:
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