Brief Summary of Minutes of Annual Meeting

NE184 rewrite. Greg Porter presented version 2.0 of the proposal. It has been examined twice by the rewrite committee. The length of the document needs to be reduced to fit within national guidelines. Detailed discussion of the document was tabled until the next morning, when all present will have had a chance to read it. The revised proposal will be reviewed by five scientists outside the NE region. After their comments are incorporated, the proposal will go to the NERA Multistate Advisory Committee for a recommendation and then to the NERA Directors for a final vote.

State, Federal and Provincial Site Reports for 2001. A discussion arose concerning continued Canadian participation. It was noted that NE184 seed meets Canadian Federal standards but provincial rules in NB or PEI prevent us from sending seed from a farm with the ring rot pathogen present. State reports updated the meeting participants on clone performance and weather conditions during trials.

Comments from Industry Representatives. No industry representatives were present. C. Yencho suggested that we should invite industry representatives to one of our meetings every few years, and that we have a session where we listen to them (rather than have them listen to us). D. Halseth suggested that we could also invite them to observe some of our trials.

Pathology Test Reports.

• Nematology (B. Brodie). This activity continues to offer all breeding programs screening for resistance to the golden nematode. Currently he is evaluating NY, ME, USDA (Beltsville), NB and Frito Lay material. He can screen for resistance to both races Ro1 and Ro2. Ro2 has been found on growers land where 5-6 years of successive plantings of Ro1-resistant lines has apparently selected for Ro2.
  
• Early Blight and Powdery Scab (B. Christ). Reports on clone performance were distributed.
  
• Late Blight, Corky Ringspot and TSWV (P. Weingartner) All three diseases were observed in Florida this year. Late blight reactions looked like race US-11. Corky ringspot data were distributed as well.
  
• Ring Rot (D. Lambert). Ring rot test results were distributed.
  
• Viruses (G. Sewell, Maine). One ARS line from WI and one AF line look to be resistant to PLRV. A brief report on these results is available from G. Sewell.
  
• New pathologist. L. Wanner (BARC/USDA) will work with scab and has an interest in durable disease resistance.
  

Breeding Reports.

• New York (W. De Jong and R. Plaisted). R. Plaisted mentioned that NY112 is being considered for release. It does well in PA, NY, ME. Farther west or south yields and specific gravity are observed to be reduced.
  
• USDA, Beltsville (K. Haynes). Not present, but a written report was distributed.
  
• North Carolina (C. Yencho). He is making a limited number of crosses, trying to fish out genes involved in leptine synthesis, and he is performing some early generation selection.
  
• Maine (G. Porter). Planting plans were already in place when Al Reeves passed away last May. There is no written report this year, but one can find a progress report in the NE Potato Special Grant proposal. Interviews for a new potato breeder will start next week.
  
• New Brunswick (G. Tai). Their breeding report was distributed. Their new policy on releases was described. Frying potato clones are evaluated for six years. Then interested parties can perform non-exclusive testing for a further two years. After this period parties may bid for three years of exclusive testing. Six year renewable license agreements are available after this time. Chipping potato are evaluated for eight years or more, and then bidding takes place after three years of exclusive evaluation. Ultimately six year renewable licenses are negotiated.
  

Results using cluster and AMMI analysis (G. Tai). AMMI and cluster analyses results were distributed. AMMI provides a simple, easy way to interpret and summarize multistate trial data. D. Halseth and a graduate student assembled the 1998-2001 data for analysis, which was distributed as a summary report.

Seed Orders. G. Porter distributed a shopping list of advanced clones. He noted that there were some seed quality problems this past year, and expressed hope to do better this coming year. They are now performing extra testing to ensure freedom from viruses and ring rot. Breeders seed constitutes an increasing percentage of the original propagules multiplied by NE-184 each year.

Old Business. B0564-8 and AF1753-16 were nominated to represent NE184 in the 2002 national trial. G. Porter reminded the group that last year we had decided to place all our reports up on a web site. A committee of C. Hutchinson, D. Halseth, B. Christ, D. Lambert formed to investigate development of a NE184 database and web site, and will report back to the technical committee next year. They will evaluate if we want/need a common data format for future field testing performance reporting.

Site committee selection report. Next years meeting is to be held in North Carolina, possibly Charlotte, Raleigh or Myrtle Beach. Date - January 23 and 24, 2003.

Nominations committee report. Next years Executive Committee are -- Matt Kleinhenz, Chair; Walter De Jong, Vice-chair; and Craig Yencho, Secretary.

Resolutions committee: (Adopted)

Whereas Dr Alvin F. Reeves, potato breeder and long-time NE-184 participant, passed away in May of 2001, let us observe a moment of silence in his memory and gratefully recognize his many NE-184 accomplishments and the years of friendship that we shared with him.

Meeting adjourned at 1:20 pm, January 19, 2002.

The NE-184 project was formed in the mid-1970s to respond to the trend to ever increasing proportions of potatoes being industrially processed for consumption. One goal was to replace pesticide dependency with naturally resistant selections carrying improved industrial-processing characteristics. Another goal was to increase the quality attributes of potatoes grown in the region to enhance their suitability for processing markets and fresh consumption. A third goal was to develop replacement potato cultivars that were less costly to grow and better suited to processing and regional fresh market niches.

2001 Outputs:Advanced clone testing: Nineteen advanced breeding lines were evaluated against 10 NE-184 "standards" in replicated field trials in 2001. As expected, performance varied by location. But several selections outperformed standard lines at several locations. Measures of performance included yield, yield of US#1 tubers, chipping color after storage, cooking characteristics, and specific gravity (an indicator of dry matter content).

Germplasm trials: Several sites tested breeding materials of varying stages of development against named cultivars. Performance measures included total yield and size distributions, specific gravity and cooking characteristics. Additionally disease resistance and physiological defects were recorded. Several advanced breeding lines were identified that warrant additional scientific or commercial evaluation, based on yield, appearance, processing and/or cooking quality. Information from the 2001 trials will be used in future variety selections. Information from 2001 also provided breeders with information on the inheritance of specific traits and narrow versus broad adaptation of individual clones.

The accomplishments report by state is included as Appendix A of the meeting minutes. Please go to the minutes‘ url to view these reports.

Kleinhenz, M.D., D.M. Kelly, E.C. Wittmeyer, B. Schult, D.R. Miskell, J.Y. Elliott, W.D. Bash, and R.J. Keller. 2001. Report of results from the 2000 Ohio potato germplasm evaluations, the North-central (NCR84) and Northeast (NE184) Regional Projects Cooperating, The OSU Horticulture and Crop Science Series No. 706, Jan. 2001. 53 pp.

Kleinhenz, M.D., E.C. Wittmeyer, Mark A. Bennett, and Richard L. Hassell. 2001. Variety selection for resistance to abiotic stresses, a summary of Ohios involvement in the North-central and Northeast Regional Genetics and Breeding Projects. Potato Association of America Annual Meetings, 2001. Amer Jour Potato Res. In press.

Kleinhenz, M.D., W.D. Bash, J.Y. Elliott, D.M. Kelly, B.Schult, G.W. Wenneker, and E.C. Wittmeyer. 2001. Ohio. In: National potato germplasm evaluation and enhancement report, 1999, seventieth annual report by cooperators. USDA-ARS, ARS-158. K.G. Haynes (ed.). pp. 253-266.

Kleinhenz, M.D., E.C. Wittmeyer, and D.M. Kelly. 2001. Identification of potato varieties adapted to Ohio conditions  An update on research at The OSU-OARDC in 2000. Ohio Fruit and Vegetable Growers Congress and Ohio Roadside Marketing Conference, Feb. 7-9, 2001. Proceedings. pp. 118-119.

Kleinhenz, M.D., E.C. Wittmeyer, D.M. Kelly, and W. Bash. 2001. Potato variety development and selection for Ohio. Ohio Fruit and Vegetable Growers Congress and Ohio Roadside Marketing Conference, Feb. 7-9, 2001. Proceedings. pp. 123-124.