This will not likely be the choice of most people, bt my favorite strawberry is Yellow Wonder, an alpine strawberry.

Alpine strawberries are everbearers, but the fruit they produce is small, the biggest ones are maybe as large as the top joint of my middle finger. Average sized ones are smaller. They are incredibly sweet and best of all, as far as I'm concerned, the birds and squirrels don't go after the white/pale yellow berries as they don't realize that they are ripe. Oh yeah and ripe berries are excellently flavored with a hint of pineapple.

I've grown 3 different kinds of 'regular' strawberries, but after feeding the birds and squirrels I'll stick with the alpines.

I grew them from seed sold by pinetree seed. About 25% of the plants produced red, these I moved from my main bed and the birds get most of them (they are excellent tasting as well). I got some fruit the first year with good crops each year thereafter.

~Chills

I have started growing a few strawberries in pots each summer. The local nurseries offer Chandler, Seascape, and Alpine, so I have a few of each. It actually never occurred to me that one could grow strawberries from seed. I'd be interested in knowing what are the best.

I like growing strawberries in pots. It is easy to change the soil when needed, none of this methyl bromide the commercial growers out in the valley use, not that we are allowed to use it anyway. And if the local wildlife gets interested, it is easy to throw a net over and fasten it so they can't reach the fruit. I have a lot of trouble with even my parsley for some reason. Some animal, probably a ground squirrel, eats it like candy. We have so many food plants here that we are a magnet for wildlife. We keep the deer out with a fence, but the smaller critters find their way in.

Rosefolly

The Italian musk strawberries are my favorite. They have a delicious sweet flavor with hints of muscadine, raspberry, and pineapple. Next would be the white and yellow alpine strawberries. Third would be the Mara de Bois strawberries, which are productive all year long, sometimes fragrant like the alpine strawberries. The ones I have been eating over the winter aren't as sweet as during the summer. Perhaps the sunshine isn't as strong this time of year to ripen them up sufficiently.

Shannon,

Based on reading catalogs and comments made here, I have tried Earliglow, and Sparkle. These are June bearing, and I think from your post, in what you are most interested.

In my climate, and my soil, the Sparkles won hands down for fresh eating. Sweet, tasted like old fashioned strawberries and melt in your mouth soft. The Earliglows were tarter and firmer (not rock hard), and very good for preserving as jam or frozen berries that end up getting a lot of sugar when you make jam or freeze in syrup. Both are smaller berries especially during the last picking.

Petro

I grew red Alpine strawberries from seed last year. The plants were very healthy looking and grew great, but the berries were extremely soft and had little flavor.

Could that be due to too much water or something?

I expected to love them, but found them completely worthless.

In your area, I'd definitely recommend a June bearing cultivar that was developed in the eastern US. So as much as I like cultivars such as Hood, Totem, and Rainier (all developed in the Pacific Northwest), I won't recommed them to you. It's much too hot in NC for them, and you'll have poor fruit quality.

Anyway, my favorite eastern cultivar (for flavor) is definitely Earliglow. It's been around for ages, and the reason it's not a standard commercial cultivar any longer (except in some PYO operations) is because it has a somewhat short shelf life, and sizes down during the season. However, the flavor is so excellent that most home growers don't care the fruit is small!

After some uneven results in pots with various day neutrals, I tried Ozark Beauty last year, and was very pleased. Tasty fruit and they really kept bearing!

Now if I could only figure out how to winter the pots and not get 50% mortality.

Murky, which Alpine strawberry did you raise from seeds? I've usually bought them as plants from the local nursery, with Baron Solemacher and Mignonette being my favorite reds.
The yellow and white Alpines here are much better than the reds, sweeter, more aromatic, and ever bearing.
Also, it could have been your source. An eBay merchant sent me some Duchesnea indica plants, mock strawberries, and claimed they were Fragraria virginiana, native Virginia strawberries. As soon as they bloomed with yellow flowers, I politely sent them back to her, with some information on Duchesnea indica. It's easy to make mistakes.
The nursery below looks okay. She claims to have Pineapple Crush alpine strawberry seeds, which I grew years ago, and really liked.

Here is a link that might be useful: Fraises des Bois

I'm growing: Earliglow, Tristar, Allstar, Cardinal, Tennessee Beauty, Honeoye, Quinault, and some type of alpine from a "kit".

I liked Fairfax (it had to have been named for the old USDA experiment station there) but can't find it any more and it is really too hot here for them. They were the sweetest.

Thanks altadenamara,

I'll have to check out the link again. Most of the area I was thinking about for strawberries is now slated for asparagus. After getting those plants started I wound up putting them in my community garden plot that gets tilled annually and didn't bother to save the crowns at the end of the season becaues the berries were so insubstantial and soft.

I'm pretty sure they were "Italian Alpine" from Territorial Seed, fragaria vesca. I bought them from Portland Nursery.

I don't have the packet to look at since I sent the remnants to another gardenweb member.

Try Delamrvel(Earliglow parentage) or Honeye, you won't be disappointed.

I planted 60+ plants over the weekend. Hopefully i get to sample a few yet this spring.

I have just bought two Quinault plants. This is my first foray into growing anything. I originally thought I could grow them in pots, but my husband says no. I said then I'd put them on a section of our front lawn that gets sun most of the day, but he says they will spread all over the front lawn and onto next door's lawn and I should not have bought them. I need some help here. Can they be grown in pots, and if not, how do I plant them. We have limited space. Any good books or sites anyone can recommend?