Michael Keens and the Birth of the Modern Strawberry

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The Complete Strawberry On this day, Michael Keens, a market gardener from Isleworth, exhibited the first large-scale cultivated strawberry at the Royal Horticultural Society. Now when it came to strawberries, Michael combined two important variables: flavor and appearance. It’s hard to imagine, but large garden strawberries as we know them today didn’t exist before the…

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July 3, 2020 Being More Water-efficient, Dog Days, Gilbert Laing Meason, Michael Keens, Lambertus Bobbink, William Henry Davies, The Reason for Flowers by Stephen Buchmann, and Calvin R. Sperling

The Daily Gardener Podcast Album Cover with a pot of rosemary - the herb for remembrance - beckoning gardeners to remember to listen to the show. Updated September 2025.

Subscribe Apple | Google | Spotify | Stitcher | iHeart Support The Daily Gardener Buy Me A Coffee  Connect for FREE! The Friday Newsletter |  Daily Gardener Community Curated News 5 ways to adopt a more water-efficient approach to gardening Let the Dog Days Begin   Botanical History On This Day 1796 Gilbert Laing Meason,…

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The Spy Who Loved Strawberries: Michael Keens’s Revolutionary Berry

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This botanical history post was featured on The Daily Gardener podcast: Click here to see the complete show notes for this episode. July 3, 1859 On this day in horticultural history, The Preston Chronicle and Lancashire Advertiser bestowed upon eager gardeners a morsel of wisdom regarding the cultivation of what was then the most coveted…

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July 3, 2019 Clearance Plants, Gilbert Laing Meason, Michael Keens, Lambertus Bobbink, William Henry Davies, Grow in the Dark by Lisa Eldred Steinkopf, Hakonechloa All Gold, Richard Evans Schultes, and Calvin Sperling

The Daily Gardener Podcast Album Cover with a pot of rosemary - the herb for remembrance - beckoning gardeners to remember to listen to the show. Updated September 2025.

Subscribe Apple | Google | Spotify | Stitcher | iHeart Support The Daily Gardener Buy Me A Coffee  Connect for FREE! The Friday Newsletter |  Daily Gardener Community Monologue Sometimes the plant gods smile on you with a clearance sale featuring something genuinely spectacular like Japanese Forest Grass or, in this case, Hakonechloa ‘All Gold.’…

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