Strawberry x Raspberry hybrid plant photos

I have been messing around with plant breeding for as long as I can remember.  Some simple things, others more complicated.  I mentioned in an earlier post that I have recently crossed a strawberry with a raspberry.  I am very excited about this.

I wasn't planning on putting up any pictures until Spring once I know what will survive winter and the plants will be a lot larger and more worth looking at.  But I have had some people email and ask for photos, so I made this post to put up the first few pictures.

They aren't great pictures, and the surviving plants have grown a fair bit since the pictures were taken.  It takes me a while to get photos from the camera to the computer and I hadn't noticed how small they were when I took the last pictures, but they are the first pictures of strawberry raspberry hybrids that have been taken in one hundred years.

From what I can gather, deliberately attempting to create strawberry raspberry hybrids has a long history in which very few people have participated.   The low number of attempts may be due to the fact that few people ever plant raspberry seed or strawberry seed so no accidental hybrids have been created, or it may be the difficulty involved in making the cross and getting the hybrid seeds to germinate, or it may have something to do with albino or partially albino plants that don't survive, or hybrid necrosis, or it may be due to the resultant hybrids not being great, or perhaps some other reason, or a combination of several factors.

It appears that the first recorded hybrid of a strawberry and a raspberry was about 156 years ago.  Apparently a letter from Isaac Anderson-Henry exists from November 1862 that mentions successfully making a strawberry raspberry hybrid, I have not been able to see a copy of this letter.  Isaac Anderson-Henry later discussed his strawberry raspberry hybrids in a letter to Charles Darwin in early 1863, Darwin replied and asked questions as he was curious to whether the hybrids produced fertile seeds.  That is about all I know, I am not sure if the questions were answered, I don’t know what happened to the plants, I don't know if plants were sent to Darwin, I don’t know if the hybrids fruited or even flowered, and I am struggling to find any actual information other than their apparent existence.  Being so long ago it is not surprising that no photographs exist of these hybrid plants.

I can’t find any mention of anyone attempting to make strawberry raspberry hybrids such as this for about another 52 years.   In 1914 Luther Burbank created strawberry raspberry hybrids and we have the first photos of the hybrid plant leaves and flowers.  We don’t know how many successful attempts he made, or anything of the parent stock, but there are various written accounts by Burbank and others.  From these we learn that the strawberry raspberry hybrid plants were very vigorous, they were completely thornless, they flowered profusely, but they did not produce viable seed nor did they really fruit.  From the many flowers that opened all they produced were a few seedless drupes.  Unfortunately there is no record of the taste of these seedless drupes, nor do we know if they were edible.  These plants were eventually destroyed by Burbank as they weren't productive.

I can’t find any mention of anyone attempting to make strawberry raspberry hybrids such as this for another 104 years when I successfully attempted the cross.  There are plenty of reports of people saying that they should attempt this in the future, but no one who tried giving a report of their success or failure.   When I say that I can’t find any mentions of anyone attempting hybrids such as this I did find mention of strassberry (which is just a variety of strawberry) and "funberry" Rubus illecebrosus (which is a Japanese species of Rubus that is not a hybrid at all).  There are also a few reports of strawberry raspberry hybrid fruit being sold at markets, these reports were mostly unsubstantiated but a few were confirmed as R illecebrous.

I have grown various species of both raspberries and strawberries from seed several times.  I often find it difficult to tell the difference between strawberry seedlings and raspberry seedlings until the plants get large.  I tend to label everything so this isn't really an issue.  These young strawberry x raspberry seedlings look much like the seedlings of either parent.

The young strawberry raspberry hybrid plants are tiny and look much like any strawberry seedling or any raspberry seedling of similar age.  The cotyledons were within the limits of variability normally seen in either strawberry or raspberry seedlings.  The first two or three true leaves looked much like the first few true leaves in any strawberry or raspberry leaves.  One even had the first few true leaves almost completely round with just a few tiny bumps on the edge, which was novel, but not out of the limits of variability that I would normally expect to see.

After about the fourth set of true leaves they started to get what I assume the adult leaves will probably look like.  At this stage they look a lot more like strawberries than raspberries.  The leaf edges are rather jagged, and so far they are all trifoliate but this may change as they age.  The strawberry parents are usually all trifoliate, as can be seen in the picture below the raspberry parents are mostly trifoliate but sometimes have five leaflets per leaf.

Leaves of one of the raspberry parent stock - this is NOT a hybrid

 

Here is the first picture of a strawberry raspberry hybrid, it is the first picture taken of such a hybrid in one hundred years.  It is less than impressive isn't it.  Even at this stage some were starting to die off.  They could be cotyledons of either strawberries or raspberries.

Strawberry x raspberry hybrid cotyledons

Once the strawberry raspberry hybrids grew and started to get a few true leaves many more seedlings had died off.  Again the picture is not all that impressive.

Strawberry x Raspberry hybrids starting to get true leaves

Then they started to grow true leaves that look like strawberry leaves.  Many are joined and not entirely even, this will even out somewhat as they age and is often seen in both strawberry seedling as as well as raspberry seedlings.  

As they grew they started looking more like strawberry plants.  Some leaves are still not entirely even.  I haven't taken any pictures in a while, my plants have actually grown a fair bit since these were taken.  They look a lot like strawberries, but the leaves are still not yet always even, they are rather jagged, and the edges tend to curl and roll up a little.  Winter also seems to be taking its toll on my little seedlings but I haven't take any pictures of that.

Strawberry raspberry hybrids - looks like strawberries at this stage

I have lost many seedlings due to complete or partial albinism, and some that failed to thrive.  I still have several healthy looking seedlings and I hope at least one will survive winter.  I don’t know if I should expect them to drop their leaves and go dormant over winter, or if they will keep their leaves but not grow, or if they will continue growing slowly.  At this stage I plan to protect from frosts as they are still very small and see what happens.

I planted most of the crossed seed but will be able to plant the rest in spring and hopefully have a better survival rate.  Every time I have both raspberry and strawberry flowering I intend to collect pollen to try to get more hybrid seeds.

Hopefully by this time next year I will have some decent large plants that will flower.  I intend to take more pictures of anything that survives in spring.  If they flower I will try to put up some more pictures then too.

Perhaps one day I may sell them through my for sale page, but even under the best case scenario if everything works out well this won't happen for a few years.

Edit to add: I sent samples of these plants to the CSIRO who tested them and determined that they are true intergeneric strawberry raspberry hybrids.  The results can be seen here.