USPP29966P2 - Strawberry plant named ‘Preakness’ - Google Patents

Abstract

The present invention provides a new and distinct strawberry variety designated as ‘Preakness’ (a.k.a. ‘108965’).

Description

Latin name of the genus and species: Fragaria x ananassa.

Varietal denominations: ‘Preakness’ (a.k.a. ‘108965’).

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

The present invention relates to a new and distinct strawberry plant designated as ‘Preakness’ (a.k.a. ‘108965’). ‘Preakness’ is a day neutral strawberry plant.

‘Preakness’ (a.k.a. ‘108965’) is the result of a controlled-cross between a female parent cultivar designated ‘106734’ (unpatented, proprietary cultivar) and a male parent cultivar designated ‘108296’ (unpatented, proprietary cultivar) made by the Inventor and was first fruited in Watsonville, Calif. growing fields. Following selection and during testing, the plant was originally designated ‘108965’ and subsequently named ‘Preakness’.

These new varieties were asexually reproduced via runners (stolons) by the inventor at Watsonville, Calif. Asexual propagules from the original source have been tested in Watsonville growing fields and to a limited extent, grower fields in high elevation. The properties of these varieties were found to be transmissible by such asexual reproduction. These cultivars are stable and reproduce true to type in successive generations of asexual reproduction.

BRIEF SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

This invention relates to a new and distinctive strawberry plant designated as ‘Preakness’. This strawberry plant is primarily adapted to the climate and growing conditions of the central coast of California. This region provides the necessary temperatures required for it to produce a strong vigorous plant and to remain in fruit production from March through October. The nearby Pacific Ocean provides the needed humidity and moderate day temperatures and evening chilling to maintain fruit quality for the production months. ‘Preakness’ presents strong ease of harvest qualities including good visibility though petiole canopy of fruiting plants, and a good flower stem length to petiole length ratio. The plant presents a semi-upright growth habit and a round to oblate plant shape, and produces mostly conic fruit and globose conic fruit. The mid-April through mid-September yield of ‘Preakness’ is high and the cull rate is low.

The following traits and photographs in combination distinguish strawberry plant ‘Preakness’ from known strawberry varieties. In addition, each of these new cultivars was confirmed to be a unique strawberry germplasm when tested against the California Seed & Plant Lab, Inc. (Elverta, Calif.) database using Short Sequence Repeats (SSRs). Plants for the botanical measurements in the present application were grown as annuals. Any color references are made to The Royal Horticultural Society Colour Chart, 1995 Edition, except where general terms of ordinary dictionary significance are used. The fruit produced by each new cultivar is attractive and of excellent quality.

DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The accompanying color photographs depict various characteristics of the cultivar as nearly true as possible to make color reproductions.

FIG. 1 shows fruits of ‘Preakness’.

FIG. 2 shows sliced fruits of ‘Preakness’.

FIG. 3 shows ‘Preakness’ plants.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

‘Preakness’ (a.k.a. ‘108965’)

This invention relates to a new and distinctive day-neutral type strawberry cultivar designated as ‘Preakness’. It is primarily adapted to the climate and growing conditions of the central coast of California. This region provides the necessary temperatures required for it to produce a strong vigorous plant and to remain in fruit production from March through October. The nearby Pacific Ocean provides the needed humidity and moderate day temperatures and evening chilling to maintain fruit quality for the production months.

The following traits in combination distinguish strawberry variety ‘Preakness’ from the known strawberry varieties. Plants for the botanical measurements in the present application were grown as annuals. In the following description, color references are made to The Royal Horticultural Society Colour Chart, 1995 Edition, except where general terms of ordinary dictionary significance are used.

The detailed botanical description in Table 1 was observed when the plants were 33 weeks after planting.

‘Preakness’ has not been observed under all possible environmental conditions, and the phenotype may vary significantly with variations in environment. The following observations, measurements, and comparisons describe this plant as grown under normal conditions in Watsonville, Calif. unless otherwise noted.

TABLE 1
Preakness

CharType	Characteristic	Preakness
General	Plant Habit	annual
	Plant Growth Habit	semi-upright
	Plant Height	26 cm
	Plant Width	30 cm
	Plant Width-Crown	5 cm
	Density of foliage, vigor	light
	Plant vigor	moderate
Leaf	Terminal leaflet width (mm)	75
	Terminal leaflet length (mm)	75
	No. teeth/terminal leaflet:	14 to 18
	Shape of the terminal leaflet base	obtuse
	Shape of terminal leaflet in cross-	concave
	section
	Margin description of the terminal	serrate to crenate
	Color of upper side of leaves	137A
	Color of lower side of leaves	139C
	Leaf blistering	weak
	Leaf glossiness	medium
Limbs	Petiole length (cm)	10.5
	Petiole diameter (mm)	3.89
	Petiole color	145A
	Petiolule length (mm)	19
	Petiolule diameter (mm)	3.89
	Attitude of hairs on	upwards
	petiole and pedicel
	Stipule pubescence	medium
	Stipule length (cm)	2.6
	Stipule size	small
	Stipule width (cm)	0.7
	Stipule anthocyanin	absent
	Stipule color (color code)	145A
	Pedicel color (color code)	145A
	Peduncle length (cm)	20.5
	Peduncle size	medium
	Peduncle attitude	semi erect
	Peduncle pubescence, attitude of hairs	medium, upwards
Inflorescence	Inflorescence position relative to	even to above
	foliage
	Flower arrangement of petals	overlapping
	Petal length (cm)	1.4
	Petal width (cm)	1.2
	Petal number per flower	5 to 6
	Upper Petal color	155B
	Lower Petal color	155C
	Calyx diameter (cm)	3.2
	Corolla diameter (cm)	2.4
	Sepal length (cm)	1.6
	Sepal width (cm)	0.3
	Time of flowering
	(50% of plants in bloom)	March
	Shape of stigma	capitate
	Color of stigma	4A
	Length of style (mm)	2
	Color of style	4A
	Color of the ovary	145B
	Length of the stamens (mm)	4
	Number of stamen	22
	Anther color	20A
	Shape of anther	dorsifixed
	Size of anther	small to medium
	Amount of pollen	moderate
	Color of pollen	15B
	Color of filament	145C
	Length of filament (mm)	3
	Number of flowers per truss	3 to 7
Stolon	Stolon number	3
	Stolon anthocyanin	183A
	Widest diameter of stolon	3.82
	At leaf attachment (mm)
	Stolon color	145A
Fruit	Number of fruit per truss	2 to 5
	Fruit length (cm)	5.2
	Fruit width (cm)	4.7
	Fruit skin color	45A
	Fruit flesh color excluding core	44A
	Fruit core length (cm)	2.9
	Fruit core width (cm)	1.7
	Fruit core color	37A
	Fruit weight (g)	26.3
	Predominant fruit shape	conic to short
		wedge
	Shape difference between primary	Similar shape
	& secondary fruits
	Width of band without of achenes	medium
	Fruit glossiness	medium to strong
	Position of achenes	below surface
	Achene color	145A
	Achenes per fruit	220
	Achene weight (g)	0.1
	Position of calyx	inserted
	level of adherence of calyx	strong
	Color of calyx	137A
	Firmness of flesh	medium to firm
	Evenness of flesh color	nearly even
	Sweetness (brix)	6
	pH	3.42
	Yield (g per plant per season)	2817

When ‘Preakness’ is compared to the proprietary female parent (106734), ‘Preakness’ presents its florescence as a spray of flowers from a relatively small roundish plant. However, the female parent is a large cylindrically shaped tower-like plant with a uniformly distributed presentation of large bright white florescence that protrudes from canopy as though from all areas of the plant and at different levels appearing to be topiary-like. ‘Preakness’ flowers are much less visible from a distance of 100 feet away whereas flowers of the female parent are prominently visible in a mass-planting large test block. ‘Preakness’ also differs from its female parent because many of the fruits of the female parent have a single long crease that appears to divide the fruit into two parts, and have a long flattened conic shape. Furthermore, the fruit of the female parent is conic and long conic but with variance between orthogonal mid-line latitude dimensions that accounts for the Spanish language planchada descriptor, as in flattened. Compared to the female parent, the plant shape of ‘Preakness’ has a semi-upright plant growth habit and is oblate to round in shape. The female parent presents an upright plant growth habit and has a large cylindrically shaped tower-like fruiting plant. The cull rate of fruiting plants of ‘Preakness’ is slightly lower than the cull rate of the female parent.

When ‘Preakness’ is compared to the proprietary male parent (108296), fruits of the male parent are primarily long conic and conic in shape while fruits of ‘Preakness’ are conic and globose conic in shape. Fruits produced by ‘Preakness’ are significantly larger than fruits produced by the male parent.

When ‘Preakness’ is compared to the check variety ‘Monterey’ (U.S. Plant Pat. No. 19,767), ‘Preakness’ differs from ‘Monterey’ in plant size and shape. ‘Monterey’ is larger and taller with more cylindrical shape than ‘Preakness’ having a small plant size and a round plant shape. Additionally, fruiting plants of ‘Preakness’ are higher than fruiting plants of ‘Monterey’ when comparing a flower stem length to petiole length ratio. ‘Preakness’ plants are slightly less susceptible to powdery mildew than ‘Monterey’ plants. Fruits produced by ‘Preakness’ are smaller than fruits produced by ‘Monterey’.

TABLE 2
Comparison of fruit features between ‘Preakness’ and
the proprietary female parent

		FRUIT
HYBRID	HYBRID	WIDTH	FRUIT
ID	NAME	(mm)	HEIGHT (mm)
106734	Female Parent	40.83	49.96
108965	Preakness	40.47	45.27

	FRUIT
	RATIO		HARD-
HYBRID	(Height/	FRUIT	NESS	Yield
ID	Width)	SHAPE*	(newtons)	(g/clone)
106734	1.22	7	7.78	1771
108965	1.12	6	7.62	943
*Fruit shape: 1. Oblate; 2. Globose; 3. Fan Lobes; 4. Necked; 5. Short wedge; 6. Symmetric conic; 7. Conic; 8.Long conic; 9. Long wedge

TABLE 3
Comparison of fruit features between ‘Preakness’ and
the check variety

		FRUIT
HYBRID	HYBRID	WIDTH	FRUIT
ID	NAME	(mm)	HEIGHT (mm)
Check	Monterey	43.70	48.33
Variety	(U.S. Plant
	Pat. No. 19,767)
108965	Preakness	40.47	45.27

	FRUIT
	RATIO		HARD-
HYBRID	(Height/	FRUIT	NESS	Yield
ID	Width)	SHAPE*	(newtons)	(g/clone)
Check	1.11	6	9.04	840
Variety
108965	1.12	6	7.62	943
*Fruit shape: 1. Oblate; 2. Globose; 3. Fan Lobes; 4. Necked; 5. Short wedge; 6. Symmetric conic; 7. Conic; 8. Long conic; 9. Long wedge

Claims (1)

The invention claimed is:

1. A new and distinct cultivar of strawberry plant named ‘Preakness’ substantially as shown and described herein.

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