Boysenberry
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A boysenberry is a cross between a loganberry, a raspberry, and the Pacific blackberry.[2] For a berry, this is a very large fruit (8.0g), with large seeds and a deep maroon color.[3]
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[edit] Discovery
It was first cultivated on Rudolph Boysen's farm in northern California. Walter Knott was the first to commercially cultivate it in southern California.[4] His family's small restaurant and pie business eventually grew into Knott's Berry Farm.
In the late 1920s, George M. Darrow of the USDA began tracking down reports it had encountered of a large, reddish-purple berry that had been grown on a farm by a man named Rudolph Boysen.[4] He enlisted the help of Walter Knott, a Southern California farmer who was known as a berry expert. Knott hadn't heard of the new berry, but he agreed to help Darrow in his search for the berry.
[edit] Knott's Berry Farm
Darrow and Knott learned soon after that Rudolph Boysen had abandoned his growing experiments several years earlier and sold his farm. Undaunted by this news, Darrow and Knott headed out to Boysen's old farm, on which they found several frail vines surviving in a field choked with weeds. They transplanted the vines to Knott's farm where he nurtured them back to fruit-bearing health. Walter Knott's began selling the berries at his farm stand in 1935 and soon noticed that people kept returning to buy the large tasty berries. When asked what they were called, Knott said, "Boysenberries," after their originator.[5] As their popularity grew, Mrs. Knott began making preserves which ultimately made Knott's Berry Farm in Buena Park, California world famous.
[edit] References
- ^ Boysenberry Characteristics. Oregon Raspberry and Blackberry Commission. Retrieved on 2008-02-22.
- ^ What is a Boysenberry?. Retrieved on 2008-02-22.
- ^ Oregon's Raspberries and Blackberries. Retrieved on 2008-02-22.
- ^ a b Oregon's Raspberries and Blackberries - History. Retrieved on 2008-02-22.
- ^ Knott's Berry Farms History. Retrieved on 2008-02-22.
