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12 CapitalPress.com June 10, 2016 Waldo CONTINUED from Page 1 In a 33-year career with the USDA’s Agricultural Re- search Service in Corvallis, working in partnership with horticulturists at Oregon State University, Waldo bred and introduced the state’s best known, even beloved, berry varieties. In 1943 he released the Willamette raspberry, which was widely planted for 50 years. He crossed strawber- ry selections OSC 2315 and Puget Beauty to produce Hoods, which were released in 1965 and retain something of a cult following among consumers for their color and outstanding flavor. Marions were destined to be his most enduring, com- mercially successful work. Drawing in part from the in- vasive Himalaya blackberry that takes over rural hillsides and empty city lots, Waldo developed the trailing black- berry cultivars Chehalem and Olallie and crossed them in 1945 to produce what was first called OSC 928. He released it as Marion in 1956, naming it for the county where most of the test plantings had oc- curred. Marions, which like other trailing blackberries are grown on a trellis system, rapidly re- placed Evergreens, an upright variety that couldn’t compete with Marion’s flavor. Trailing blackberries also have smaller seeds, which don’t have to be removed during processing, and are more aromatic than erect blackberries. At its height of popularity, Marions made up half of Or- egon’s blackberry acreage. In 2014, Marions alone account- ed for $19 million in farmgate value. Chad Finn, a USDA-ARS research geneticist who now holds Waldo’s berry breed- er position in Corvallis, said much of Waldo’s work was “classical plant breeding,” which is “always a combina- tion of art and science.” Waldo understood the in- heritance of plant traits, and had to be able to recognize which berry selections would make good parents, Finn said. He said Waldo’s work in de- veloping trailing blackberries may be overlooked. “One of the things that I think is lost, really, is that he created a whole crop that never existed before,” Finn said. “That’s remarkable. We would be dead in the water without him or somebody like him.” The quiet man George Waldo probably wouldn’t have described himself that way. Finn, the USDA breeder now on sta- tion in Corvallis, has stud- ied the work of his pre- decessors and said Waldo strikes him as a reserved man who didn’t seek the limelight. Jim Love, the Forest Grove berry grower, said he occasionally saw Waldo in the halls at Oregon State University when Love, now 73, was a student there in the 1960s. Waldo appeared quiet and business-like, Love said. Outlook CONTINUED from Page 1 are among the state’s food processors and beverage man- ufacturers, predominantly breweries,” Lehner wrote in the forecast. Jeff Stone, executive di- rector of Oregon Association of Nurseries, said the report’s projection of an upswing for nurseries is accurate. Stone said nurseries spent Loans CONTINUED from Page 1 Growers who previously obtained regular operating loans are now seeking those guaranteed by FSA, which reduce banks’ exposure to risk, he said. Some of those who are at risk of defaulting on guaranteed loans are also refinancing into direct FSA loans, which carry zero risk for banks, Hoefner said. The concern is that as Eric Mortenson/Capital Press USDA berry breeder Chad Finn, shown in this 2014 photo, praises the work of the late George Waldo, who introduced Marion blackberries and Hood strawberries. Waldo was a longtime member of the Corvallis First Baptist Church, and of Gideons International, the group that leaves Bibles in motel rooms. According to one story, when Waldo and associates would tour growers’ fields and stop for lunch, Waldo wouldn’t eat at a place that served beer. Waldo was born Dec. 2, 1898, in North Dakota, and moved with his family to Oregon in 1913. He gradu- ated from what was then Or- egon Agricultural College in 1922 and earned a mas- ter’s degree in science from Michigan State University in 1926. He was hired by USDA and in 1932 was able to re- turn to Corvallis to work in “small fruit investigations” at the experiment station, a partnership of USDA-ARS and Oregon State. That formal partner- ship — coupling innovative USDA berry breeders with university horticulturists — is the only one of its kind in the world, said Bernadine Strik, OSU Extension berry crops professor and the ber- ry research program leader at OSU’s North Willamette Research and Extension Center in Aurora. The partnership is more than 100 years old and is funded by USDA and OSU, which jointly release new berries, Strik said. “That facilitates adop- tion of cultivars of commer- cial significance in the Pa- cific Northwest,” she said. “A lot of the berry crops grown here were bred for this region by this pro- gram,” Strik said. “Growers are fortunate to have a pub- lic breeding program that is so productive.” Elsewhere, much of the berry breeding work is done by private companies, she said, and the genetic mate- rial is not available to the public or to growers who are not contractually obli- gated to the company. The partnership has continuity. Strik has been at OSU since 1987; Finn arrived at USDA-ARS in 1992. Finn decides which selections to cross, and has final say on releases. All the It’s a testament to George Waldo that his best work still grows in Oregon’s berry fields, even though change is afoot. Hood strawberries sell fast at roadside stands and are in demand from ice cream processors. But the variety most commonly planted the past six to eight years is Tillamook, devel- oped by Chad Finn. Marion blackberry acre- age is in slow decline, dip- ping from 4,500 acres in 2006 to 3,100 acres in 2015. Processors, worried about li- ability lawsuits, have fretted for years about the Marion’s fierce thorns getting into jams or pies. Growers wish Marions were more cold-har- dy; Jim Love said he “didn’t pick a berry” three times in the past due to cane-killing freezes. Many are planting new thornless trailing blackber- ries: Black Diamond and Co- lumbia Star, both released by Finn. Love has some of both, and thinks Columbia Star will be a good one, even if the flavor doesn’t quite match the Marion’s. “Marions are becoming less (prominent), surpassed by cultivars bred by Chad,” said Strik, the OSU berry crops professor. “That’s what you hope happens; you move forward. “Oregon continues to be known as the premier black- berry growing region in the world,” she said. “It’s a fact.” After Waldo retired, he moved to Marysville, Wash., which was nicknamed the “Strawberry City.” In 1970, the American Pomological Society award- ed Waldo its Wilder Medal, given to those who have ren- dered outstanding service to horticulture. “Special consideration is given,” the society’s website says, “to work relating to the origination and introduction of meritorious varieties of fruit.” Waldo died Dec. 22, 1985, a Sunday. He was 87. The family asked that memori- als be made to his Corvallis church and to Gideons Inter- national, for its evangelical work. much of the past six years try- ing to hang on as the state and nation rode out the recession. As conditions continue to im- prove, the call for landscap- ing, gardening and agricultur- al trees and plants picked up with it. “We have an opportunity to grow significantly over the next 10 years,” Stone said. “I don’t think it will be the rock- et ship we saw 20 years ago, but there are shortages out there. “We’re looking at markets three to five years out, and I think we’re well positioned to grow.” Depending on the year, greenhouse and nursery prod- ucts is Oregon’s first or sec- ond most valuable agricultur- al sector, sometimes trading places with calves and cattle. In 2014, greenhouse and nurs- ery products were worth $829 million. Lehner, the state econ- omist, said overall Oregon continues to see “full throttle” growth rates, with job gains and wage gains outpacing other states. The state is ap- proaching full employment for the first time since 2000, and “underemployment,” the number of people involun- tarily working part-time, is back to where it was before the recession. The state’s un- employment rate, 4.5 percent in April and May, is actually below what would historical- ly be considered normal for Oregon during an economic expansion, Lehner said. Over the past two years, Oregon has added an average of 5,000 jobs per month, a 3.5 percent annual growth rate, according to the report. Lehner projects continued strong Oregon growth through the end of 2017. The state’s longterm outlook is damp- ened somewhat by the new minimum wage law, which he said will result in 40,000 few- er jobs by 2025 than would have been the case otherwise. “Our office is not pre- dicting outright job losses,” Lehner emphasized in the analysis. “However we are expecting somewhat slower growth. Low-wage workers receiving raises in the near term boost incomes. Over time, however, employers will adjust by increasing worker productivity, possibly via cap- ital for labor substitutions. “The Great Recession caused severe damage that has taken years to repair,” Lehner said in the report. “However, Oregon is now quickly ap- proaching full employment, or a healthy labor market.” farmers with existing op- erating loans become more reliant on FSA programs, less money will be available for new growers who need credit, he said. “We don’t want the be- ginning farmers to be short- changed,” Hoefner said. Van Hoose, of the Farm Credit Council, cautioned that the rising demand for FSA loans doesn’t indicate there’s a serious deterio- ration of overall U.S. farm finances, but it does reflect the troubles faced by some individual growers. “It’s very individualized,” he said. “If it’s your operation, it’s a pretty big problem.” On the whole, though, debt-to-asset ratios haven’t risen significantly, interest rates are still at historic lows, and prices for key inputs such as fuel and fertilizer have fall- en, Van Hoose said. During the recent boom in commodity and land prices, farmers generally didn’t be- come overly “leveraged” with debt when buying property, instead using cash, he said. “For the most part, farmers have come into this downturn in pretty good shape.” The problem for the FSA program is that officials may commit to making loans even if they don’t have available funds, said Hoefner. Once more funds are ap- propriated, the agency will be able to make those previ- ously committed loans. How- ever, less funding would be available for later loan appli- cations, potentially causing another shortfall even earlier next spring, he said. For that reason, the Farm Credit Council, National Sus- tainable Agriculture Coalition and other groups want to in- crease the fiscal 2017 funding to cover the current shortage and avoid an even bigger problem next year. They estimate $650 mil- lion is needed to meet current demand for FSA direct and guaranteed loans in the cur- rent fiscal year, which ends in October. Agricultural appropria- tions legislation, which has passed key Senate and House committees but not the overall Congress, funds the direct and guaranteed loan programs for next year at $2.892 billion. However, the funding would only need to be raised about $16.5 million to make the necessary loans this year, since the money only has to cover the costs of admin- istering loans and not the full loan amount, Hoefner said. “You can get a lot of loan value out of a relatively small appropriation due to the low interest rates,” he said. Eric Mortenson/Capital Press Eric Mortenson/Capital Press Bernadine Strik, OSU berry crops professor and extension researcher, says the collaboration between OSU and USDA-ARS pays off for growers. Marion blackberries, now gaining color in blocks up and down the Wil- lamette Valley, were introduced by renowned USDA breeder George Waldo nearly 60 years ago. They remain Oregon’s leading blackberry, with a 2014 farmgate value of $19 million. advanced berry trials are managed by Strik at North Willamette. “My number one goal is to help growers pro- duce sustainable yields of high-quality crops,” Strik said. “In a global market, that’s what you need to be able to do.” Legacy remains