'Dawlish Wild' Sea Beet

Beta vulgaris subsp. maritima

Origin: Dawlish, Devon, England

Improvement status: Cultivated wild material

Seeds per packet: ~30

Germination tested 12/2024: 85%

Seed harvested, Fall 2024.

Life cycle: Perennial, biennial, and annual

Sea beets are the wild ancestors of all modern beets and chards. They come in a range of forms and colors, much like cultivated beets, and can range in size too, though most are quite small (smaller than a violet plant or dandelion). They can also be annual, biennial, or even perennial — and this one seems to be one of those! From the reports of our grower, Jason Mills of Oshkosh, Wisconsin, this sea beet produces tasty green leaves over a long season (think small Swiss chard), grows larger than most common sea beets, and — tantalizingly — the plants didn't die after flowering and going to seed. We won't know for sure until their third year in the ground if they're truly perennial, but based on the structure of the root system and this report from Jason, it seems there's a really good chance at least some of the plants will prove to be perennial. So if you're interested in breeding a new perennial chard variety, this is probably a great place to start!

This sea beet originally comes from a population of mostly uniform wild plants growing along a seaside path near a small resort town called Dawlish in the county of Devon in southwestern England. It was collected in 1987 by two USDA scientists, Drs. Devon Doney and Ike Whitney. They described the collection site, 15 meters above sea level, as "silt soil, along path leading to sea above sheer cliffs." We've requested and received quite a few sea beets through the years from the USDA's National Plant Germplasm System, but this is the first one to make its way into our catalogue. We're grateful to Jason for sticking with it and getting a bountiful harvest of seeds!