Brief Summary of Minutes of Annual Meeting

Alfalfa Populations – lead by Brummer, Moore and Riday primarily.  Making synthetics of four populations.  2021 first sets of selection for northern group sent out.  Syn₁ seed for testing to multiple sites.

Breeding Insights made genetic maps and predictive models for performance of a number of traits. Models so far have relatively high R-values

Need tissue samples (3 trifoliates from each plant – freeze dried) to come back to Breeding Insights.

 Peal (Logan, UT) sent is lines to Brummer.

Tissues samples needed from Quebec and Lethbridge.

Cornell has submitted materials. 

St. Paul (Xu) has sent materials but has additional material.

Brian Irish needs seed for generation of additional populations

Those who haven’t sent materials, make selections while maintaining the four germplasm pools.

2020 nurseries – collect data, collect tissue, maintain, seed at each site.

Plan on sending seed to Brian Irish in 2026.

New Materials to Irish in 2027

Question – can we pool sward data – is there value?

AOSCA varieties?

Cesar Medina Culma shared slide on pre-breeding of the four north alfalfa groups and check populations.  Siberia is the most different group.  Six traits are monitored – survival, plant architecture, leaf hopper resistance, yield, fresh weight.  GWAS data presented for leaf hopper, freshweight, yield

These models are similar to the Holstein model already in use.

Brummer and Irish have southern germplasm pools (2-3 lbs) to be used at various locations. Among the southern germplasm, the South American non-dormant germplasm is completely different from other germplasm pools.

Trefoil report – Popadopoulos – captured on Zoom.

Cover crops – Moore participating with Brown and Bishop-von Wettberg on survival and winter hardiness for winter pea in USDA zones 3-6.  Cover Crop Breeding Network (https://www.covercropbreeding.com/)  especially looking for cereal rye cropping sites – single row for coverage and allelopathy.  Mentioned that several western sites had very low yields of cereal rye depending on when they shut off the water.  Mentioned that cereal rye as a cover crop is a weed issue in wheat production areas.  Baldwin reported successful selection for the removal of secondary seed dormancy in crimson clover allowing for earlier seed germination and cover crop establishment in the South.

Switchgrass – work concluded.  The release of Tusca (imazapyc resistant), Espresso and Robusto (removal of seed dormancy for rapid germination lowland and upland types, respectively) from Mississippi State University.  Mike Casler’s germplasm has undergone 3 cycles of selection for increased yield.  Some smut research continuing at University of Georgia Athens (Porcha Smith).

Cool Season Grasses

Joel Robbins reported on meadow brome, orchardgrass, timothy, tall fescue collaborative work taking place in Utah, Saskatchewan, Quebec, and Alberta.  The effect of water-soluble carbohydrates on winter hardiness.  Selections for synthetics for forage quality aspects this fall.

Tall fescue – Cornell, northern site. Developed in GA, looking for G x E assessment.

Condensed tannins – Popadopoulos – results presented at Plant Canada Conference.

Miscanthus – new triploid giant miscanthus germplasm development under way, with testing at University of Illinois, Alabama State University and Mississippi State University

Alfalfa trial going in at Tulee Lake CA.  Potential grass, alfalfa clover trials at Cornell (red clover trials initiated every year. Isoflavones found in red clover being assessed. Cereal rye as cover crop going in this fall – call for test sites?

Kissing Kucek establishing crimson clover test this fall.  Looking to establish a data base from the cover crop test of this group with 2 or more varieties.   Suggestion was made to search for extension variety trials that might be up online.

Brian Irish speaking about Crop Germplasm Committees (CGC) – Specialty crops still has some funds.  No funds left for forage legumes.  Funding expansion request is in for Senate action.  Road map for industry to go to Congress and push for additional funding.  ASTA (American Seed Trade Association) looking for funds to keep or get viability of germplasm-stored seed back.  Irish pushing to organize the meeting of CGC.

Presentation by Craig Biel (Breeding Insights) They are a USDA-ARS funded entity to support ARS with service and technology transfer models.  Especially for plant materials that are tetraploid or hexaploidy.  Their inception was in 2018.  The are working extensively with alfalfa, some red clover and cover-crops.  Markers are $12/sample for genotyping, DNA extraction and typing $2.50/sample.  The farthest along is alfalfa, with all genotyping using the same marker system (3,000 marker panel system for alfalfa).

Question raised as to whether we/they could access the Noble Foundation alfalfa germplasm.  Brummer believes most of the material was returned to the companies that provided it.

Question raised, has any effort been made by Breeder Insights for the cool season grasses? – some work with tall fescue, orchardgrass, meadow brome, perennial ryegrass and annual ryegrass.

New Ideas and issues worth mentioning:

Universities are cutting forage variety trials.  Is there a better model?  Neal Tallue working on submitting a centralized model of variety testing. Similar to the Canola trial model?  Or the N-TEP model (though this is industry funded).

Perhaps pursue satellite imaging for estimating forage yield and species makeup.

In hairy vetch, NDVI and Height give a estimation of biomass (early season, just NDVI is sufficient), after 100% coverage, height is needed.

Apps for species composition in cover crops and forages.

G x E x M (Genotype x Environment x Management)

Intercropping – Wolf – Auburn – a project of crimson clover and oat. 

Minnesota has a projection of oat and pea – pea is the cash crop.  Also, Nova Scotia, Quebec, and Kentucky.

Next year’s meeting University of Kentucky, Lexington, Tim Phillips host.  Jesse Morrison (Mississippi State University) secretary.

Short term outputs include alfalfa populations being sent to multi-site trials.

Outputs include the release of switchgrass varieties by Mississippi State.  The release of Tusca (imazapyc resistant), Espresso and Robusto (removal of seed dormancy for rapid germination lowland and upland types, respectively) from Mississippi State University. 

Activities include alfalfa population screening, birdsfoot trefoil selection, forage and biomass grass selections, and cover crop evaluation.

Milestones include the development of triploid Miscanthus germplasm.

Mastreta A, Tobin D, Bellon M, von Wettberg EJ, Cibrian A., Wegier A, Monroy-Sais A, Galvez-Reyes N, Ruiz-Arocho J, Chen YF. 2024. Human management of ongoing evolutionary processes in agroecosystems, Plants People Planet.  https://doi.org/10.1002/ppp3.10521

Marques, E., Bueno E., Kerwein L, and von Wettberg E. (2024). Improving rotational partners: Intraspecies variation for pea cover cropping traits. Agrosystems, Geosciences, and Environment. 7. e20490. DOI: 10.1002/agg2.20490

Delaney-Studer S, von Wettberg EJ, Towards the next angiosperm revolution: agroecological food production as a driver for biological diversity. 2023 Elementa, special topic on “'New Pathways to Sustainability in Agroecological Systems” https://online.ucpress.edu/elementa/ article/11/1/00134/197385/Toward-the-next-angiosperm-revolution