ETTERSBURG STRAWBERRIES 



Successful Hybridizing of Many Species and Varieties in Northern California 



Leads to Production of New Sorts Which Are Apparently Adapted 



to Meeting Almost All Requirements. 



Roy E. Clausen 



Instructor in Genetics, College of Agriculture, University of California, Berkeley, 



Calif. 



IN THE early seventies a Captain 

 Cousins, in command of a freighter 

 plying between North and South 

 American Coast points, brought from 

 Callao, Peru, to Eureka, California, some 

 plants of the sand strawberry, Fragaria 

 chiloensis, indigenous to that region. 

 He turned these plants over to A. J. 

 Monroe of Eureka, and from him Albert 

 F. Etter of Briceland, California, ob- 

 tained the strain of Peruvian Beach 

 strawberry which he has since used so 

 successfully in his strawberry breeding 

 work. This strawberry crossed with 

 an inferior third generation seedling of 

 Sharpless x Parry gave, among twelve 

 others, his first superior seedling, Rose 

 Ettersburg. Since then Mr. Etter has 

 made numerous other crosses, using not 

 only the wild Peruvian beach straw- 

 berry, but the beach strawberries native 

 to California as well, the wood straw- 

 berry of the interior of California, the 

 Alpine strawberry, and in later times 

 others in addition to these. Some 10,000 

 seedlings have been fruited in the course 

 of the twenty years following the ])ro- 

 duction of the Rose Ettersburg straw- 

 berry, and the success that has been 

 achieved well merits the attention here 

 given it. 



Mr. Etter's success is unqueslionaljly 

 due to the skilful way in which he has 

 united the advantageous characteristics 

 of a niunber of distinct species and 

 forms, and cannot, therefore, be con- 

 sidered intelligenth' without giving due 

 attention to these forms. In the course 

 of his work he has made a considerable 

 collection of strawberry varieties and 

 species, including a large number of the 



varieties grown commercialh' in the 

 United States and several from French 

 sources, besides the strictly wild species 

 of which a number are represented. 

 The first and foremost of the species 

 which Mr. Etter has used is F. chiloensis, 

 the sand or beach strawberry. This 

 strawberry is native to the Pacific 

 Coast of the Americas and is distributed 

 from South American points well up 

 into Alaska, and has also been collected 

 at Argentine points on the east coast of 

 South America. In this region it is 

 strictly coastal in its habitat, growing 

 at most perhaps not more than 2 miles 

 inland. It grows on the bleakest and 

 most wind swept situations, enduring 

 alike the sterile soil of the beach and 

 the salt spray of the ocean. Even in 

 Alaska, Georgeson^ writes of it thus: 



THE BEACH STRAWBERRY 



"The species is known as Fragaria 

 chiloensis. It grows along the coast 

 from Muir Glacier to Prince William 

 Sound and probably also in other places, 

 but throughout this region it is quite 

 abundant. Its favorite soil is the sand 

 and gravel along the old beach line just 

 above the reach of high water. It here 

 disjjutes the possession of the surface 

 with grasses and weeds of many kinds 

 and is quite able to hold its own against 

 them." 



In fact where\'er found it appears to 

 be a notable characteristic of F. 

 chiloensis that it is able l^y virtue of a 

 deep rooting system and liardy foliage 

 to endure the most unfavorable condi- 

 tions with respect to the fertility of the 

 soil and the availal)k> supply of moisture. 



> Georgeson, C. C. An. Rcpl. Alaska Expt. vSta., VW), p. 11. 



