April is peak strawberry month in southern California, and I just tasted a bunch of different varieties at the Santa Monica farmer’s market. I noticed a lot of vendors had “Gaviota” which I had seen there before but had never seen anywhere else. It was my favorite variety. I noticed it was sweet no matter the color, even the ones that looked under-ripe were better than the bright red frontera strawberries, or even Cabrillo. Mara des bois was more complex, but Gaviota was my favorite.
Despite so many vendors selling Gaviota at the booths, it looks like home growers can’t really get it yet? Has anyone found a way to grow this?
I’ll be following this for leads. I bought a box of Gaviota strawberries while in NYC visiting a friend 3 or 4 years ago. They were the sweetest store bought strawberries I’ve ever had. One can only imagine how good they would taste when picked perfectly ripe from the garden.
Gaviota is characterized by its exceptional fruit quality (especially flavor), large fruit sizes on the order of 26-28 grams per fruit, and a plant form that is open, compact, and erect in comparison with Camarosa and Chandler. Also, fewer small fruit are produced, resulting in a cull rate that is only half that of Camarosa. Gaviota fruit have better rain tolerance than Camarosa.
This seems to have been posted in June 14, 2009 so they have been around for quite a while.
Can’t seem to find any online leads for a sale. Mentionings of the berry but that’s it. If anyone comes across this variety I’d love to get my hands on some.
I just found out that this farm sells the “Gaviota strawberries”, I wonder if they could spare some plants to sell you? Contact They are located in Coachella Valley.
Actually those are nurseries that are licenced to sell strawberries in general, and at least some of them do not carry ‘Gaviota strawberries’, I checked the websites of the ones that have websites.
I have been slacking on actually growing strawberries, I do the research, and then I don’t actually get them.
Yes, I have found a place that carries them, or at least they used to, they don’t list it on their website right now, try contacting them, and asking them https://lassencanyonnursery.com/
I think that the best way to get the strawberry plants, would be to visit ‘pick your own strawberry’ places in California, that is where that strawberry is popular. Some of them must carry it, someone could e-mail, or call around beforehand to see which places carry it
I hope that someone can collect a runner for you next April or May, from one of the pick your own places, if you luck out I could always collect a runner from one of your future plants
Here are other places that have pick your own that I have found
nyone manage to get their hands on Gaviota? Otherwise, I have a sister that lives 15 mins from the last farm @alanmercieca linked… Her kids like strawberries so I should be able to convince her to at least go, though figuring out how she could get some Gaviota strawberry plants from it too would be the real challenge.
I have not gotten them, although I just found some places that carry Gaviota plants in Los Angeles, of course that is of no use to me since I live on the east coast, and they don’t ship the plants, it’s just for local sales. The appear to stop selling the plants each year sometime in April.
Laguna Hills Nursery in Santa Ana has Gaviota strawberry plants Google Search
and so does Logan’s Gardens, they sell them at the Santa Monica Farmer’s market on Wednesday here Google Search , and at the Hollywood Farmer’s market on Sunday here Google Search
As far as getting Gaviota runners from that you pick strawberries farm, the only way that would be possible would be to ask them for permission to do that, chances are that they would not allow that because they propagate the next years strawberry crop from those plants, also they would not want any flowers, or unripe strawberries taken so if they gave permission to take a runner or two, that would only be runners with no flowers or unripe berries.
It’s a hybrid to begin with, and so that is very very unlikely, and it’s easy to get Gaviota plants now for anyone who can get to Los Angeles easily. We just have to be patient. It’s no longer under patent and so Gaviota can now easily be propagated by runners.
i don’t think they’ll be willing to ship me just 10 if they do have it…