Sweet Secrets: Celebrating National Pick Strawberries Day
This botanical history post was featured on The Daily Gardener podcast:
May 20, 2021
On this day, as with every May 20th, we delight in National Pick Strawberries Day—a celebration of one of the world’s most beloved sweet fruits. There is much more to strawberries than meets the eye, and their history and biology are almost as fascinating as their flavor.
The origins of the name “strawberry” trace back not to straw, but to the phrase “strewn berry,” describing how the plant’s runners spread berries “strewn about the ground.” As perennial members of the rose family, these charming plants produce delicate flowers (usually five to seven petals each) before yielding their iconic red fruit.
Strawberries also hold a unique honor in the produce world: they are the only fruit to wear their seeds on the outside—an average of 200 per berry! And if you thought you had a rare fear, consider “Fragariaphobia,” the little-known word for the fear of strawberries.
When it comes to harvesting, strawberries are a labor of love: pickers must hand-select ripe fruit every three days! A single acre can yield nearly 50,000 pounds of fruit. California alone produces about a billion pounds each year, providing roughly 75% of America’s strawberries, with Florida and North Carolina rounding out the top three producers.
Writers have captured the strawberry’s allure as well. Toni Morrison once wrote,
“I have only to break into the tightness of a strawberry, and I see summer - its dust and lowering skies.”
And Tsugumi Ohba’s Death Note Box Set offered this playful promise:
“If you keep my secret, this strawberry is yours.”
Whether picked fresh from the vine or savored in memory, strawberries bring with them the taste—and the secrets—of summer.
