Strawberries (Fragaria × ananassa) in the United States are almost entirely grown in California 86% of fresh and 98% of frozen in 2017 with Florida a distant second. Of that 30.0% was from Monterey, 28.6% from Ventura, 20.0% from Santa Barbara, 10.0% from San Luis Obispo, and 9.2% from Santa Cruz. The Watsonville/Salinas strawberry zone in Santa Cruz/Monterey, and the Oxnard zone in Ventura, contribute heavily to those concentrations.
Production has risen steadily from 2005 when were harvested through 2017 when were harvested. The 2005 season's harvest sold for $1,122,834,000. The 2017 harvest sold for $3,100,215,000.
The California Strawberry Commission is the Agriculture Department body which advocates for strawberry growers. The CSC provides information for both growers and consumers. Some towns have annual strawberry festivals, see . The Driscoll's company began with strawberries here and still grows and sells here; they have since expanded to other states, countries, and types of berries.
Cal Poly runs the for both research, and producer education.
Economics and labor
Productivity routinely averages . In 2017 that resulted in a total of worth $3,100,215,000.
In 2017, growers received , which was 1.126x the average value/weight for fruits, and compared to for Florida growers. were harvested, facing Mexican imports of . Growers paid $12.60/hour on average to farmworkers. In 2005 Santa Maria was far below Oxnard and Salinas–Watsonville. By 2019 however Santa Maria had become the highest producing area in the state for both conventional and organic. In 2021 were harvested, almost all from the same three longstanding areas, Oxnard, Santa Maria, and Salinas–Watsonville. This requires totalling 50-60,000 in the summer peak.
Pest management
Regional Integrated Pest Management Centers (Regional IPM Centers) hosts a suggested IPM plan for strawberry.
, Cooperative Extension SB provides detailed recommendations and practices. For their cultivar recommendations see .
there is increasing interest and increasing progress in automated (robotic) phytopathology in this crop, especially monitoring for insects and UV-C application for mites.
Diseases
The use of soil fumigation was highly praised and widely recommended by the California Strawberry Advisory Board in 1967. Strawberry production here has been highly productive ever since but also highly dependent on fumigants. So vital was the most common fumigant methyl bromide that the ongoing phase out of the chemical has sent growers and researchers scrambling for alternatives. One alternative specifically for nematodes is 1,3-Dichloropropene, however some of the finely textured soils in some of the state's soil regions reduce its efficacy, and there are restrictions in some townships on maximum rates. Soil solarization is another option. Stapleton et al., 2005 eliminate almost 100% of annual weeds in this crop with solarization alone. It completely fails against yellow nutsedge however.
Various strains of Botrytis cinerea are the most common and most impactful disease of this crop. Botrytis leaf spot was first discovered here. Conventional strawberry requires many fungicide sprays per season. Losses can commonly be 3040% if fungicides are not competently employed, or not permitted as with organic. If lower temperatures and high rain persist unusually long, such a control failure will cost 5060% of the yield at this point the season is abandoned and 100% of revenue will be lost.
Strawberry crown rot is a major disease here as it is in any productive growing region. Genetic markers for CR resistance would make a significant difference in yield. Shaw et al., 2008 is a starting point for such screening, using the markers they found. See and .
Daugovish et al., 2012 finds the introduction of drip irrigation has reduced asymptomatic Colletotrichum acutatum presence in nurseries, and thus lower anthracnose in the resulting transplants. See and for a treatment see .
The only effective treatment of Fusarium Wilt may be genetic resistance. Pincot et al., 2018 tested UCD varieties for resistance and located , a dominant gene explaining almost all FW resistance. Fw1 is very likely to be a toll/interleukin-1 receptor (TIR) nucleotide-binding leucine-rich repeat (NB-LRR) gene. They also identify seven accessions which are fw1 (recessive susceptible homozygous) yet nonetheless resistant, and thus predicted to carry yet-unidentified novel genetics. See .