Apple Scion Cultivars Part 2

Apple Scion Cultivars Part 2. I’m Greg Martin with today’s Fruit Grower Report.

WSU’s Kate Evans and her team have been researching what she calls elite selections or new apple varieties to see if their various aspects are right for the northwest growing region.

EVANS: That will give you the confidence to go ahead and move forward with some of these selections. And things like how well do those selections take wax for example. I mean, that’s a genetic factor. Choosing the right genetics helps on all of those different elements.

Evans was looking at the breeding program from back to front.

EVANS: The phase before that is even kind of wider for us in the breeding program, it’s more testing. We’re really honing in on trying to find the right genetics that fit for you. So again, we’ve got different trial sites across the state giving us much more information.

And she looks at the beginning of the program

EVANS: And even stepping back a phase, the first phase of the breeding program, at this point we’ve got about 24,000 trees, each of them single tree blocks so they’re unique individuals. We’re seeing a really wide range of genetics and what we can do is pick out the best genetics out of this whole site.

The WSU Tree Fruit Research & Extension Center is working to find better cultivars that will thrive in the growing conditions of the northwest.

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