Progress 10/01/23 to 09/30/24
Outputs
PROGRESS REPORT Objectives (from AD-416): 1.Breed new peach cultivars with desired fruit characteristics and horticultural traits such as tolerance to spring frost and winter chilling inadequacy, and resistance to diseases to improve peach production in the Southeastern United States. 1A. Breed new high-chill peach cultivars for the main season industries in the Southeastern United States. 1B. Breed new moderate-chill peach cultivars for the lower coastal plain in the Southeastern United. 2.Breed new peach rootstocks with resistance or tolerance to significant biotic and abiotic stresses such as soil-borne diseases peach tree short life (PTSL) and Armillaria root rot (ARR), and pests such as root-knot nematodes to improve peach production in the Southeastern United States. Approach (from AD-416): New improved cultivars will be developed to address key challenges such as unreliable cropping due to vulnerability to suboptimal climatic conditions and diseases, or to replace those becoming obsolete, incurring extra management costs or having unsustainable production issues. Cultivar development will continue toward improved fruit size, attractiveness, uniformity, firmness, eating quality, increased soluble solid contents, and extended harvest seasons. Parents with slow ripening fruit flesh and labor-saving tree architecture traits will be used to develop new cultivars that allow more consistent harvests with conduciveness to packing and shipping and help mitigate emerging labor shortage concerns. These superior selections will then be named and released for use by the commercial peach industry. Rootstock development will build on �Guardian�, �MP-29� and �P-22� by improving resistance to peach tree short life, Armillaria root rot and root-knot nematodes and expanding the range of scion vigor control that is more dwarfing than �MP- 29� or between �MP-29� and �Guardian� or �P-22�. This will be accomplished by utilizing identified resistant lines. Typically, interspecific hybrids within Prunus exhibit a substantially wider range of vigor than is possible with pure peach hybrids. Extensive field testing will be utilized to identify those hybrids which have the requisite combination of disease resistance and horticultural traits for successful commercial utilization the southeastern U.S. peach industry. Best selections will be released for commercial utilization. Objective 1A. ARS researchers at Miami, Florida made hand crosses for the high-chill peach cultivar development program. Peach seedlings generated in the previous pollination season were planted into the field. Seedlings and advanced selections are being evaluated during the season. Promising advanced selections nearing completion of evaluations were scaled up in anticipation of impending releases. Three new licenses have been granted to another commercial nursery to propagate and sell trees of three recently released peach cultivars. With help of the USDA-ARS Office of Technology Transfer, two new early-season peach cultivars were patented and released for commercial use. Four new licensing applications were received and are currently being processed. Objective 1B. Due to a critical vacancy, no hybridizations were made for the moderate-chill peach cultivar development program. Field evaluation of moderate chill selections were performed by collaborators. Breeding materials are being maintained by project lead scientist, program technicians and collaborators in the project. After a new Scientist was hired recently, ~75 advance selections will be introduced from the Texas A&M peach breeding program and planted in Byron in Spring 2025 as advanced parents for moderate-chill peaches. The trees will be budded at Burchell Nursery. Seedling plots were evaluated organoleptically and ~75 open-pollinated seeds were collected from 4 interested selections. Objective 2. Due to a critical vacancy, no hybridizations were made for the rootstock development program, nor were any evaluation trials established. Breeding materials are being maintained by project lead scientist, program technicians and collaborators in the project. After new SY was hired recently, a new rooting experiment with 500 cuttings on mist bench has been established and 3064 P-22 seeds have been collected from the P-22 block to look into PNRSV virus transmission. In addition, seeds will be collected from P-22 x Harrow Blood F1 seedlings to look for both ARR resistance and dwarfing growth habits after they are mature. Objective 3. This is a newly established objective. The position remains vacant and has no progress report. Artificial Intelligence (AI)/Machine Learning (ML) Photos of healthy and symptomatic peach leaves with certain diseases are being taken, which are considered to be used in AI/machine learning of peach leaf health status. ACCOMPLISHMENTS 01 Release of two new early-season peach cultivars. New and improved peach cultivars remain in high demand by the Southeastern peach industry. Two early-season peach cultivars, developed through conventional breeding by ARS scientists at the Southeastern Fruit and Nut Research Laboratory in Byron, Georgia, have been released for commercial use. Licensing applications from two commercial nurseries have been received and are being processed. The two new cultivars provide the peach industry with improved early-season alternatives. 02 Development of optimal algorithms for image processing of peach leaves. Image processing facilitates advanced applications in peach breeding and production, including high-throughput phenotyping and precision agriculture. Scientists at Fort Valley State University and the Southeastern Fruit and Nut Research Laboratory in Byron, Georgia have developed optimal algorithms for image processing and characterization of healthy and symptomatic peach leaves with certain diseases, which can be used for accurate assessment and potential AI/machine learning of peach leaf health statuses.
Impacts
(N/A)
Publications
- Chen, C., Okie, W.R. 2024. �Cardinal Joy� Peach. HortScience. 59(2):264- 265. https://doi.org/10.21273/HORTSCI17592-23.
- Chen, C., Okie, W. 2024. �May Joy� Peach. HortScience. 59(7):919-920. https://doi.org/10.21273/HORTSCI17670-23.
|