As strawberries go it looks small and insignificant, but there is a phenomenal story behind one 113-year-old Australian variety; it involves a shipwreck, floods and garden tourism during a goldrush.

More than a century after the Phenomenal strawberry variety was developed, Queensland Government horticulturists have gifted a handful of the extremely rare plants to agricultural students in the district where they were first created.

Agriculture teacher at Gympie State High School, Bob Leitch, said the strawberry plant donation would assist students in learning about Gympie's local agricultural history.

"These are one of the oldest existing varieties of strawberries," Mr Leitch said.

"They're very small with very intense flavour, and they've been donated to us as part of our program to educate the students more about the history of strawberries here in Australia."

The tiny, flavoursome Phenomenal strawberry variety was developed 113 years ago. ( Supplied: Queensland Department of Agriculture and Fisheries )

From England to Brisbane

The series of events that led to the creation of the heritage strawberry variety started as far back as 1826 when the 6th Duke of Devonshire, William George Spencer Cavendish, appointed Sir Joseph Paxton to head up his grand Chatsworth Gardens in the heart of central England's Peak district.

Paxton hired ambitious apprentice gardener George Flay, who decided to fast track his career by forging a new life in Australia and boarded the ill-fated immigrant ship, Phoebe Dunbar.

Flay was an apprentice gardener at historic Chatsworth Gardens in central England. ( Supplied: David Vintiner, Chatsworth Gardens Trust )

The Phoebe Dunbar ran aground after the captain mistook his location. ( Supplied: The Maritime Heritage Association )

The journey had a dramatic ending when the tall ship ran aground at Amity Point on North Stradbroke Island in 1856.

But Flay, his wife Emma and two young daughters survived the shipwreck and after first taking up land in Brisbane, they headed north to settle in a district he named Chatsworth, after his stately former workplace.

Just kilometres away the booming town of Gympie was in the grips of a goldrush, bustling with miners and the businesses supporting them.

Flay established a productive tourism garden near Gympie. ( Supplied: State Library Queensland )

Flay battled the elements and setbacks to realise his dream of creating his own horticultural garden.

He grew strawberries, more than 300 varieties of roses, as well as ranunculus, gladioli, watsonias, a wide range of fruit trees and 40 different types of grapes.

In 1893 a journalist wrote of Flay's pioneering success for the Gympie Times and Mary River Mining Gazette, and said:

"After years of labour and repeated disasters, from floods and hailstorms, he has at last succeeded in transforming a one-time wilderness into a veritable Garden of Eden."

'Satisfaction guaranteed': Goldrush garden tourism

The Gympie State High deputy principal, Sally Becker, described how families would visit Flay's gardens for picnics and would come dressed up in hats, suits and long flowing skirts.

George Flay owned Lot 6 at Chatsworth, identified in this 1873 map. ( Supplied: State Libary Queensland )

"His property became known as Green Park, but locally it was called Strawberry Gardens," Ms Becker said.

"Because on Sundays families would visit there and strawberries were eaten with scones and cream."

Flay experimented with crossing different varieties of strawberries and in 1901 he delivered a box of fruit to town including a variety called Gympie from his breeding program.

Charles Flay took out a newspaper advertisement to boast of his new strawberry variety. ( Supplied: Queensland State Library )

By 1908, his son Charles Flay was proudly advertising in the paper that he had taken over management of the popular tourist attraction.

He crossed the Pink Prolific and Federator varieties to produce the Phenomenal strawberry.

"Visitors to Green Park Strawberry Gardens may rely upon obtaining my famous new strawberry Phenomenal; satisfaction guaranteed," Charles Flay wrote.

The Flay family eventually sold their gardens and the tourist attraction no longer exists.

But the Phenomenal strawberry remained the foundation of Queensland's commercial strawberry crop for half a century, before making way to larger, more productive new varieties.

How Phenomenal strawberries still exist today

For decades, 50 of the Phenomenal plants have been kept alive at the Department of Agriculture and Fisheries' Maroochy Research Centre by principal horticulturist Mark Herrington.

Dr Herrington valued them for their disease resistance and said he decided to retain the variety "because people described it as having a flavour of strawberries 'like they used to taste'".

Sorry, this audio has expired Aristocracy, plant breeding, a shipwreck and floods part of Phenomenal strawberry's history

Despite working with the plants for so many years, Dr Herrington never knew the true extent of their rich history until his daughter Anita Barnes researched the variety.

Ms Barnes revealed her discoveries during the presentation of five plants to students at Gympie State High.

"It's an amazing story that we stumbled across," Department of Agriculture and Fisheries regional manager, Jason Keating said.

"I had no idea myself about the history of it but when I learnt about it, the story had to be shared."

Gympie State High agriculture students, Torran Poulsen and Hal Daniel, after the Phenomenal strawberry plants arrived. ( ABC Rural: Jennifer Nichols )

The Phenomenal strawberry's fruit is small, intensely tasty and soft, making it more susceptible to damage and perishing in a punnet.

"But now the pest and disease-resistant old variety is enjoying somewhat of a resurgence," Ms Becker said.

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"Researchers are using the Phenomenal strawberry's genetics and crossbreeding to try and develop a species that have today's characteristics of a large red fruit; bright red colour, but with its disease resistance as well."

Long-time locals have donated what they believe are also Phenomenal strawberries. ( Supplied: Trove )

And the story does not end there.

Since news broke of the plants being delivered to Gympie State High by the research centre, more have potentially been unearthed and donated by local residents who also have a history linked to the fruit.

"Some older residents of the town claimed that they might even have the Phenomenal [strawberry variety] that their parents grew when they were young," Mr Leitch said.

Researchers hope to test those plants, grown in backyards for generations, as a potential source of valuable genetics.