Teagasc celebrated the launch of the 2018 berry season with a berry seminar held in their new research glasshouse facility in Ashtown, Dublin. The glasshouse will cater for new research and development for horticultural crops for the future. Dr Eamonn Kehoe, Teagasc Soft Fruit Specialist gave a tour of the new glasshouse facilities including his new research on the ‘Malling Centenary’ strawberry variety. The variety is quickly gaining interest amongst growers and may in time replace the current strawberry market leader ‘Elsanta’. For growers the main benefits are increases in productivity and efficiency on the farm.
The seminar also covered topics from Belgian, Dutch and Irish speakers including other new strawberry varieties that may be suitable for the Irish market, current pest threats and the huge growth in the berry sector over the last 20 years. Growers were delighted to applied research being undertaken for the berry sector.
