Greenhouse construction at TACF’s Meadowview Research Farms in VA is in its final stages of development. The greenhouse was funded through the generosity of our 2017 Spring Appeal donors, to which we are extremely grateful. The facility increases our capacity to grow seedlings, which in turn helps us increase our ability to conduct research. On March 7, a crew of 30+ volunteers from the Southwest Virginia Branch helped sow 7,500 BC3-F3 seeds in the greenhouse.
Sowing seeds into pots.
In this inaugural year at the greenhouse, seedlings are being grown for blight resistance screening using the small stem assay technique (SSA) and for an orchard blight resistance screening test. The seedlings grown for SSAs will be grown, inoculated with blight, and rated for resistance in 2018. The seedlings grown for the orchard test will be grown in the greenhouse and planted in an orchard in the fall.
Seeds sown for the SSA project represent 110 genetic families. Out of the 110 families tested this year, 60 families are replicated for the orchard test. Once the orchard test is planted in the field and the trees have grown large enough, they will be screened for blight resistance as well and ranked by family. Duplication of the blight resistance screening in the greenhouse with SSAs and in the field using traditional inoculation techniques allows us to compare rankings between families. This comparison is important as it ensures SSAs are as accurate as orchard tests.
“Thank you to the Southwest Virginia Branch for setting a record for the largest number of chestnut seeds sowed in a single day,” said Jared Westbrook, TACF Director of Science, when asked about the planting on March 7.