Not Strawberry and Raspberry Are Berries, But Bananas Are

Bananas Are Berries

Have you ever thought that bananas are berries and strawberries aren’t? Yes! It’s absolutely true. Bananas, along with pumpkin, avocado and watermelon come under the category of berries. Moreover, neither raspberries nor blackberries are berries.

What actually is a berry?

Berry is a fleshy fruit formed from the ovary of a flower with a seed. This seed will be embedded inside of the flesh of the fruit.

Botanically, a berry has three layers: exocarp (the outer skin part), mesocarp (the middle fleshy part of the fruit), and the endocarp (the seeds of the fruit). Berries must have more than two seeds. Fruits like cherries have only one seed inside the fleshy part. The fruits that have the outer skin, fleshy part, but only one seed are called as drupes.

For a fruit to be a berry, it must develop from a flower with one ovary. Plants like blueberry have flowers with only one ovary. So the fruit developed from this ovary will be categorized as a berry. Not only banana, other fruits like tomatoes, kiwis, watermelon, orange, cranberries, and eggplants come under berry family.

The flowers of raspberry, strawberry, and blackberry plants have more than one ovary. So there are called as “drupes” and not berries. Each individual ovary produces a little subunit. This subunit is actually called as drupes. Since fruits like raspberry and strawberry have a number of drupes, they are called as “aggregate fruit”.

Orange is a berry that consists of three layers with more than two seeds inside it. Although, it’s developed from a flower with only one ovary. Whereas, citrus isn’t categorized as a berry because these fruits have distinct segments and some properties that differentiate these from berries.

Because of the reason that bananas are developed from a flower with one ovary, it is called as a berry. But strawberries, raspberries, and blackberries, as we think, are not berries. I think now you are clear with which fruits are berries and which aren’t.