Brief Summary of Minutes of Annual Meeting

Due to suitability to the environmental conditions and existence of a strong peanut industry tailored to process primarily the
large-seeded Virginia-type peanut, growers in Virginia, North Carolina, and South Carolina generally grow Virginia-type
cultivars. In the view of a common interest in the Virginia-type peanut, the three states are working together through a multistate
project, the Peanut Variety Quality Evaluation (PVQE), to evaluate advanced breeding lines and commercial cultivars
throughout their production regions. The objectives of this project are: 1) to determine yield, grade, quality, and disease
response of commercial cultivars and advanced breeding lines at various locations in Virginia and the Carolinas, 2) develop a
database for Virginia-type peanut to allow research-based selection of the best genotypes by growers, industry, and the
breeding programs, and 3) to identify the most suited peanut genotypes for various regions that can be developed into
varieties. ?
The most recent cultivars, currently grown in the VC region are 'Bailey' (2008), 'Sugg' (2009), 'Titan' (2010), 'Sullivan'
(2015), 'Wynne' (2013), 'Emery' (2015), 'Bailey II' (2017), and 'Walton' (2019).
In 2028, PVQE included 26 genotypes: 5 commercial varieties and 21 advanced breeding lines developed by the North
Carolina State University and University of Florida/Virginia Tech peanut breeding programs. All breeding lines have the 'high
oleic acid' characteristic and they are marked by 'ol' letters in their names; the commercial cultivars are conventional for this
trait with the exception of Sullivan and Wynne. Genotypes were planted from May 10 through 27 at five locations: at the
Tidewater AREC in Suffolk, VA, Martin Co., NC, the Upper Coastal Plain Research Station (UCPRS) near Rocky Mount, NC,
Bladen County, NC, and the Edisto Research and Education Center at Blackville, SC. At Suffolk and Martin two digging dates
and two replications within each digging date were planted in a 5 × 5 lattice design. The first digging date was approximately
two weeks earlier than the optimum harvest date (the second digging date in this test). This setting allows identification of
early maturing varieties. At the UCPRS and Bladen County, only one digging date (optimum) replicated twice at each site
were planted. At the Edisto Research and Education Center, additional cultivars were used. For all locations, cultivars were
compared with the breeding lines for yield and grading characteristics as the ultimate objective is development of improved
Virginia-type peanut cultivars.
For objective 1-3, timely results were produced each year. More specifically, yield and farmer-stock grading data including
percentages of foreign material (FM), loose shelled kernels (LSK), jumbo and fancy pods, extra-large kernels (ELK), sound
mature kernels (SMK), sound splits (SS), other kernels (OK), and damaged kernels (DK) were measured and recorded. Price
per pound was calculated by the federal formula and the crop value per acre obtained as the product of yield times the price
per pound. This information was made available to the PVQE Advisory Committee and discussed at its annual meeting to
allow selection and release of excellent varieties that meet the high expectations of shellers, processors, and manufacturers.
In 2019, 'Walton' peanut was released as a high yielding, early maturing, and drought tolerant cultivar.
To address objective 3, only high oleic breeding lines were included in PVQE testing during the course of this project. 'Walton'
is a high oleic cultivar and it was jointly release by Virginia Tech and the University of Florida.
To address objective 4, 12 breeding lines and 2 checks were exposed to soil moisture deprivation for the later part of the
growing season using rain exclusion shelters. This test was just started in 2019 season.

Graduate students, postdocs, and farmer trainings were developed during the course of this project in 2019.

Balota, M., J. Dunne, A.B. Cazenave, and D. Anco. 2018. Peanut Variety and Quality Evaluation results I: 2019 agronomic
and grade data. Virginia Tech and Virginia Coop. Ext. Publ. SPES93-NP, 41 p. https://www.pubs.ext.vt.edu/SPES/SPES-
93/SPES-93.html