Abstract

Strawberry cultivars vary in proneness to internal browning of the pith, thought to be caused by frosting in winter. Within individual cultivars the incidence of browning was greater in weakly-growing plants than in strongly-growing ones. Plant heights and widths in the summer following exposure to a damaging winter were negatively correlated with the degree of browning, whereas heights before exposure to that winter were unrelated to browning, suggesting that damage sustained in the winter affected plant size in the following summer.