Bananas are berries, but strawberries are not?

Remember the famous dialogue’Mujhe yeh bataiye ki gende ka phool, phool hokar bhi phool kyun nahi hai?’ While most people laughed but the truth is that there is a lesson in Biology here. The answer is simple: A marigold looks like one flower, but it is actually made up of many tiny flowers grouped. Each tiny part is a separate flower. All of them together form the single round structure we see. Marigold belongs to the Asteraceae family, in which flowers are naturally formed in a cluster pattern.

Surprisingly, this is not the only such Nature’s complexity. Let’s take another instance. If someone asked you to name a berry, your first answer would be strawberries, right? After all, the word ‘berry’ is right there in the name! But here’s a twist! Bananas are real berries… and strawberries are not. Does that read strange? But it is absolutely 100% true! Let’s dive into this fruity mystery and uncover the science hiding in our lunchboxes.

Bananas: The unexpected berry 

A ‘berry’, in the world of science, isn’t just a small, sweet fruit. It has a proper botanical definition: A berry is a fruit that grows from a single flower with a single ovary and has soft flesh with lots of tiny seeds. Guess what fits this definition perfectly? And bananas? They grow from a single flower; they come from one ovary; they are soft and fleshy, and yes, those tiny black dots inside are seeds (even though they don’t grow into new bananas).

So the next time you eat a banana, congratulate yourself. You’re actually eating a botanical berry!

Strawberries: Berry in name, not in nature

Now let’s flip the story. Strawberries look like berries, taste like berries, and are loved like berries, but scientifically, they fail the berry test. Why? Because strawberries don’t grow from a single ovary. Each little seed-like dot on the outside, called an achene, is actually a tiny fruit with its own seed. That means a strawberry is basically a group of many mini-fruits stuck together! So instead of being a berry, strawberries are called ‘aggregate fruits’ just like the marigold.

Fancy name for a fruit that’s actually a team effort! Mind-bending fruit facts. To make things even more interesting, here are a few fun twists.

Tomatoes? Also berries!

Watermelons and pumpkins? They’re berries too (a special type called pepos).

Raspberries and blackberries? Not berries, just like strawberries!

The fruit world is full of surprises.

“Fruit and berry are often used as synonyms. So, while we call it a fruit in everyday terms, science classifies it as a berry, just like tomatoes, grapes, and even pumpkins. Our everyday berry, like a strawberry, is only a name sake; it is not a true berry at all because it comes from multiple ovaries. Interestingly, here is a twist: Science says a strawberry is not even a true fruit as it develops from a part other than an ovary, which is the thalamus. But technicalities of Biology aside, both are enjoyed and commonly accepted as fruits,” Ms Pinky Mathur, HOD Science, Apeejay School, Noida, explained. 

Why does this matter? 

Understanding this shows us something cool about science. Things aren’t always what they seem.  Sometimes the names we hear every day don’t match the scientific truth hiding beneath. It reminds us to stay curious, ask questions, and look beyond the surface, whether it’s about fruits, nature, or even people. So, next time you’re packing your lunchbox or enjoying a fruit bowl at school, take a moment to look closely.