I want to share a story illustrating the potential for sourcing genetics from well-funded research programs. Larger research institutions often have the budget to conduct extensive scientific trials, but are often evaluating established varieties, and don’t often involve a breeding component.
Last week I attended Small Farm School here in Oregon, a big yearly event hosted by Oregon State University Extension Service. The event is an all-day educational and networking event for small-scale farmers in the Portland metro area. There’s a wide range of subjects covered, and one of the classes I attended was a report on the dry-farming melon research program that OSU Extension has been working on for several years.
The class was a report on extensive trials of different commercially-available melons (Cucumis melo and Citrullus vulgaris), including many different “market classes” (melon types) and production methods. It was fun to see results of a well-funded trial intending to develop climate-resilient growing methods. They also brought a bunch of melons from the 6 varieties that performed the best under dry farming conditions, and cut them up for the audience to sample.
I was impressed by the flavor and quality of some of the melons we sampled, but as a burgeoning landrace/adaptation grower, it felt like the project ended just as things were getting interesting! The project went to great lengths to evaluate existing cultivars, but there was no interest or intention in crossing any of the best varieties.
I found it funny when the class instructors started preparing the melons for sampling, and scooped out all the seeds and dumped them in a bucket bound for the compost. I asked if I could take some seeds, and most of the growers gave me a funny look, explaining that the offspring would not stay true to type. The point of the class was to determine which one or two varieties performed best at the research farm, and to simply stick to those varieties for dryland production.
Needless to say, I snagged a bunch of seeds to throw in my muskmelon grex next year. I’m pretty excited that a big research institution went to such lengths to provide me with the best of the best seeds from their multi-year research project!
