Fruits and Nuts
Strawberry ‘Cordial’ – Late Season, Long Shelf Life
DEVELOPMENT OF LATE-SEASON, SHORT-DAY STRAWBERRY CULTIVAR ‘CORDIAL’
Anthony Mahama; Stephen Gray; and Walter Suza
Department of Agronomy, Iowa State University, Agronomy Hall 716 Farm House Ln, Ames, Iowa 50011.
Corresponding author: aamahama@iastate.edu
OUTLINE
1. SUMMARY
Strawberry (Fragaria × ananassa Duch. ex Rozier) cultivar ‘Cordial’ (PI 693215) is a late-season cultivar developed by U.S. Department of Agriculture-Agricultural Research Service (USDA-ARS) at Beltsville, MD, through cross-pollination of B1893 × B1805 for planting during the latter parts of the growing season (that is, late summer into autumn). It was approved for release in 2020, and patented as US PP33,636. ‘Cordial’ is described as a short-day strawberry, meaning that plants will flower as the daylength grows shorter (that is, nights grow longer) in the northern hemisphere. It was selected for its large attractive fruits that are quite firm, and tough enough for rough handling. These characteristics conferred increased shelf life and minimized the proportion of harvested produce lost to degradation compared with other cultivars and breeding selections. In addition to these characteristics, ‘Cordial’ possesses very consistent high yields and very low rot with no fumigation or fungicides in plasticulture production systems.
The goal was to develop strawberries with non-tart fruit and increased shelf life following 2 weeks of refrigerated storage, improve resistance to rot without fumigation or fungicides, and provide/maintain consistent high yields for the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States and regions with similar climates.
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2. PROBLEMS ADDRESSED
U.S. Department of Agriculture-Agricultural Research Service (USDA-ARS) strawberry research efforts at Beltsville, MD have resulted in release of several cultivars (such as ‘Keepsake’, ‘Flavorfest’, ‘Allstar’, ‘Galletta’, ‘Ovation’, ‘Earlyglow’, ‘Chandler’) with high yields and acceptable fruit flavor. However, decayed fruit, degraded fruit in refrigerated storage, poor handling tolerance, fruit rot, foliar and fruit disease incidence, and reduced shelf life remained a production problem. Therefore, the project goals were to increase shelf life, tolerance to rough handling, resistance to diseases, reduced tartness, and consistently high yields.
‘Cordial’ was developed by cross-pollinating B1893 as seed parent to B1805 as pollen parent. Combining desirable traits from the different individuals in the complex pedigree shown of the maternal parent and of the full sibling pollen parent (see Section 5 for pedigrees) identical to the successful cultivar, ‘Keepsake’, ‘Cordial’ was selected following several years of field and postharvest evaluations following crossing (2010-2018).
3. SOLUTIONS DEVELOPED
‘Cordial’ had average total yield (789 g/plant) that was significantly higher than all cultivars tested (641 g/plant or less), and also, the percent marketable yield of ‘Cordial’ (93%) was statistically higher than that of all the other cultivars, except ‘Earliglow’ (Scott and Draper, 1975) (65%) and ‘Ovation’ (60%), which were similar. ‘Cordial’ fruit skin toughness rating was very high (8.0) and statistically similar to fruits of ‘Keepsake’ (8.1), ‘Galletta’ (7.8), and ‘Flavorfest’ (7.8). In terms of fruit sweetness (measured as percent soluble solids), ‘Cordial’ fruits (7.6%) were the same as that for ‘Flavorfest’, and statistically similar to fruit sweetness of the cultivars with the highest percent soluble solids, ‘Keepsake’ (8.8%) and ‘Earliglow’ (8.6%), which had the highest flavor ratings. Percent marketable fruit of ‘Cordial’ was the same as ‘Keepsake’ (86% and 91% respectively) and significantly higher than all other cultivars tested (highest being 54%). The pH is used as a measure of fruit tartness. ‘Cordial’ fruits (pH 3.79) were the least tart of all other cultivars except ‘Allstar’ (pH 3.85). In addition to all these favorable characteristics, ‘Cordial’ demonstrated significant resistance to crown rot (a perfect score of 9.0), very mild bacterial angular leafspot disease symptoms, mild powdery mildew disease symptoms, and had runner production of 1.9, which was statistically similar to ‘Keepsake’ (2.1) and ‘Flavorfest’ (1.1), but significantly less than that for ‘Chandler’ (3.4) and ‘Galletta’ (2.8).
Collaborators involved in developing solution:
- K.S. Lewers and J.M. Enns, USDA-ARS Genetic Improvement for Fruits and Vegetables Laboratory, Beltsville, Maryland, USA
4. IMPACT
Due to its longer shelf life, less tartness, and disease resistance, ‘Cordial’ has the potential for a greater market share compared to ‘Keepsake’. However, no data are readily available.
5. GERMPLASM
‘Cordial’ is a cultivar maintained by the USDA National Plant Germplasm System. Additional information on this germplasm can be found at GRIN-Global: PI 693215.
The germplasm used to breed ‘Cordial’ was sourced from genebank accessions and breeding lines:
B1893 is the maternal parent. The pollen parent, B1805, is a full sibling of and pedigree identical to that of ‘Keepsake’ (PI 688296 or CFRA 2318.001 PL; Lewers et al., 2019). ‘Cordial’s parental pedigrees are shown below.
6. REFERENCES
Lewers KS, Enns JM. 2022. ‘Cordial’ Strawberry. HortScience 57:231-235. https://doi.org/10.21273/HORTSCI15808-21
Lewers KS, Enns JM, Castro P. 2019. ‘Keepsake’ Strawberry. HortScience 54:362-367. https://doi.org/10.21273/HORTSCI13613-18
Scott DH, Draper AD. 1975. ‘Earliglow’, a new early ripening strawberry. Fruit Varieties Journal 29:67-69.
7. CHAPTER INFORMATION
Citation: Mahama A, Gray S, Suza W. 2022. Strawberry ‘Cordial’ – Late Season, Long Shelf Life. In: Volk GM, Chen K, Byrne P (Eds.) Plant Genetic Resources: Success Stories. Fort Collins, Colorado: Colorado State University. Date accessed. Available from https://colostate.pressbooks.pub/pgrsuccessstories/chapter/strawberry-cordial-late-season-long-shelf-life/
Content originally submitted: May 31, 2022
Date of publication: July 2022
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