ALUMNI QUARTERLY
SPRING 1997

Alone or crowning something else, the strawberry's place in our gustatory fantasies is assured. But whence came the humble red fruit cradled on top of that piece of shortcake?

Berry glad to meet you. OK, that's not very funny. Indeed, we strawberries are considered to be plump lightweights in general: plopped atop shortcake, mummified in ice-cream, and unceremoniously acidified among cubes of cheese on long trays. Even served whole and alone, we are forced to accommodate white sugar and clotted cream.

But show the poor strawberry a bit more consideration! Take me by my turned-up calyx. Nibble me. Even if you think you're a connoisseur, chances are you don't know much about me, other than that I'm a strawberry, genus Fragaria (the Latin, by the way, suggests that I should smell nice). But I'm not just any strawberry. If you buy a strawberry in Quebec, you may well have a Chambly berry, and my roots reach all the way back to Macdonald Campus and McGill's new Dean of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, Deborah Buszard.

"I got into strawberries by accident," explains Buszard. "Fruit trees are my first real interest. If I could choose an environment to be in, it would be an orchard. Strawberry fields just aren't idyllic," she states. "Picking strawberries is one of the most miserable, labour-intensive activities. Strawberry research, on the other hand, is very interesting."

The nicotine weed turned Buszard into an accidental strawberry researcher. In the early eighties, the federal government, skittish over the future of tobacco farming, created the Tobacco Diversification Program, awarding grants to encourage replacement crops. At the time, the Quebec tobacco industry along the shores of the St. Lawrence River prospered with the level ground and sandy soils, which also happen to be perfect for strawberries. "I thought we could take advantage of the flat terrain for mechanical harvesting," Buszard recalls. "Then we could grow strawberries for jams and yogurts, because right now all strawberries for processing are imported."

My birth was not an easy one. I was years in the making, emerging after repeated selection for size, shape, colour, resilience and other qualities. Whereas humans have only two sets of chromosomes, we cultivated strawberries have eight sets. You can imagine the vast potential for mixing and matching in pursuit of the best berry: we have enormous variability, as scientists say.

The first strawberry released by McGill, Chambly, hit the market in 1991 after seven years of testing. It was bred specifically to be machine harvested and processed: for instance, the calyx - the tuft of green that attaches the berry to the stalk - bends up and away from the berry so that mechanical harvesters can remove the berry from the plant. But being easy to decapitate wasn't enough to ensure success; economically, the berry didn't prosper. The labour costs in Mexico and Poland are so low that it wasn't profitable to grow strawberries for processing, even with mechanical harvesting. Chambly faced a bleak future.

However, farmers thought fresh Chambly might find consumers at local markets, because the berry was sweet, red, robust and easy to pick. They were right. Now, it is the second-most popular fresh strawberry in the province.

According to Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, Quebec farmers produced $16.5 million worth of strawberries in 1995 (Quebec and Ontario, with its $19 million industry, account for nearly two-thirds of the country's strawberry crop). Almost $4 million was from Chambly. Meanwhile, the crop has helped replace tobacco, which has lost 50 per cent of its Quebec growers over the last decade. Strawberries also earn farmers close to $4,000 an acre, almost the same as tobacco. Chambly's early success has encouraged Buszard and her research partner, Shahrokh Khanizadeh, MSc'84, PhD'89, a McGill professor in plant science, to breed two more berries, Oka and Joliette, hardwired to withstand the cold Quebec winters, scorching summers and abbreviated growing seasons.

Buszard compares the berry-selection process to shopping for a house. "Say you want a house with four bedrooms and a garage in the city - there might be thousands available, but none actually perfect. Then you select the one that's closest to your original criteria. It's the same with berries: we set our goals and keep the optimal performers."

The top prospects have their seeds extracted and grown, first in a greenhouse, then in the research fields on the Macdonald Campus and at the St. Jean research station. Because of the vast genetic memory stored in each plant, the seedlings can be very different from each other. Buszard and Khanizadeh screen the plants for resistance to disease and insect pests to ensure that selections will be able to grow without pesticides.

Only in their second year do the plants produce flowers and fruit. "At that point," says Buszard, "we select the ones that look interesting. It's very much a visual assessment for vigour, disease resistance and hardiness; we might keep only one or two from a family. Those plants are evaluated in the second year of "fruiting." After a couple of years, if they're still interesting, we put them into replicated trials, where we would have many plants of one type in a 2- or 3-metre row. We may put out, say, 5,000 plants at the beginning of the year, and keep less than 20."

As a result, I ripen more quickly and am more resistant to cold and heat than my wild cousins who found root in Europe and the Americas. There are 2,000 strawberry cultivars, but 'tis I and my McGill siblings, Oka and Joliette, who can huddle under a blanket of straw all winter in the most unspeakable cold, then flower and ripen in Quebec's short, hot, humid growing season.

What sets Chambly, Oka and Joliette apart? All three are high-yielding, June-bearing plants, meaning they give more berries than your average strawberry plant. The Oka berry is a deep red at harvest, Chambly is slightly less dark, and Joliette is relatively pale. Joliette berries are the largest of the three; Chambly isn't far behind, but Oka, though still an average-sized berry, is small compared to the others. Chambly also has its unique upturned calyx. All three are flavourful, although a connoisseur might find Chambly the sweetest. Joliette stands out in the "disease resistance" category: this is one strong berry. All three plants are necessarily resistant to cold weather and can withstand -25° C when covered with 10 cm of straw mulch for winter insulation. This winter hardiness makes the berries attractive to other growers facing similar climates: Joliette is being evaluated for production in Germany, Switzerland, Belgium and Russia.

Two newer berries, Oka, released in 1993, and Joliette, fresh on the market this spring, further the experiment. "Strawberry producers were concerned with how quickly the berries grow soft and perish after harvest, so we directed our attention to developing a fruit that would stay attractive in the store for a week instead of 24 hours. We're selecting now for berries that are paler in colour, darken after harvest, and will stay firm and shiny." Other parameters also apply: the berries must be robust and tasty. Joliette, first bred by Khanizadeh in 1989 and refined and tested continuously since then, has a particularly rosy future because of its resistance to several major strawberry diseases.

Chambly, Oka and Joliette: the names themselves bespeak their Quebec heritage. But few varieties get monikers. Most sprout briefly bearing only a series of letters and numbers to designate them and cryptically describe their ancestry so that Buszard and her team could reproduce them, if necessary. Chambly is the berry formerly known as SJ84187-3. "Only when we get to the point of submitting a plant for commercial release do we give it a name, usually that of a place with agricultural links." The patents are held by McGill, so all profits for "plant breeder's rights," a sort of horticultural copyright, are returned to the strawberry program. Chambly is the first strawberry cultivar developed in Canada to actually return royalties to its producer: approximately $17,000 since 1993, from almost four million plants sold to growers. Other benefits include a strong industry in Quebec, with berry plants now being exported for growth abroad (Wisconsin, for instance, has made a pleasant second home for Chambly), and a challenging research project for training students in plant science.

Strawberries aren't as addictive as tobacco, but researchers should be aware of developing an unexpected attachment. "I'm like a parent when I see my berries in the grocery store. I get quite enthusiastic, which, of course, is completely silly. People look at me strangely." But deep down, everyone recognizes the allure of strawberries. As Buszard says confidently, "No one detests strawberries. We're producing something that gives everyone pleasure."