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Fragaria × vescana is a cultivated species of strawberry that was created in an effort to combine the best traits of the "domestic strawberry" Fragaria x ananassa (which has large berries and vigorous plants) with the "woodland strawberry" Fragaria vesca (which has an exquisite flavor, but small berries).
This cross cannot take place naturally. Fragaria x ananassa has 8 sets of chromosomes whereas Fragaria vesca has only 2 sets. Repeated attempts to cross these resulted in sterile offspring.
Researchers treated tissue from a Fragaria vesca plant with colchicine to create a mutant plant with 4 sets of chromosomes. This mutant was then crossed with a Fragaria x ananassa plant, and vigorous fertile offspring were obtained. The offspring were found to be decaploid (having 10 sets of chromosomes).
Fragaria × vescana is not yet a commercially important species. While the plants are vigorous like their F. ananassa parents, and the berries have the excellent flavor of the F. Vesca parents, the berries are unfortunately still quite small.