Tree Fruit Breeding in Washington

Tree Fruit Breeding in Washington. I’m Greg Martin with today’s Fruit Grower Report.

This year’s Annual Hort Association’s Convention and Trade Show will once again delve into a myriad of fruit industry topics including a talk by Kate Evans, Pome Fruit Breeder at WSU’s Tree Fruit Research and Extension Center on tree fruit breeding. Creating a new variety of fruit has a number of issues one of which is whether the consumer will enjoy eating it.

EVANS: Apart from all of the fruit quality issues, therefore the consumer, the taste, texture and appearance of the fruit there are all the other challenges that are more grower oriented.

Evans will be talking about the technologies and teams that make up the breeding programs.

EVANS: The technologies that are really being stressed in terms of this presentation for the Hort show are the fact that within Washington State now we have an incredible set of experts in genetics, genomics and breeding. And then also the development of pre-selection tools that are commonly known as markers that help the breeders identify really interesting seedlings early on in the life of the seedling and therefore improve the efficiency of the breeding program.

For more information on this year’s annual Hort meeting, visit their website.

That’s today’s Fruit Grower Report. I’m Greg Martin on the Northwest Ag Information Network.