Brief Summary of Minutes of Annual Meeting

Obj. 1.1 – Alfalfa germplasm evaluation and pre-breeding

Since project initiation, the team has conducted several cycles of selection within two batches of the alfalfa germplasm collection. Collaborators in northern locations (northern California, New York, Washington, Wisconsin) received additional funds through USDA NIFA Alfalfa Seed and Alfalfa Forage Systems program. Nondormant materials are also being evaluated and selected in southern California, Florida, and Washington. 

In the coming year, we will initiate a third round of screening new germplasm. We are also planting variety trials to evaluate previous rounds of selection. The team will also sequence a subset of the USDA alfalfa germplasm collection (around 1,000 accessions to be sequenced by Riday/Tilhou and 3,000 accessions by Irish). The process of releasing pre-bred populations as germplasm has been initiated for several of the northern populations, and the team plans to initiate the same process for southern populations in the next year. Heathcliffe, Tilhou, and Irish (USDA) have also used genomic prediction models and sequencing of the germplasm collection to create novel pre-bred alfalfa populations targeting specific disease and stress resistance traits. In addition, the team plans to cross promising germplasm with commercial alfalfa to make hybrids. 

New nurseries were established in Alberta and Quebec in 2025. 

Papadopoulos (AAFC) inquired about opportunities for other collaborators to evaluate the material being generated in this project. All project collaborators are welcome to plant space-planted nurseries, but the team may not have sufficient seed to add additional variety evaluation locations. Priya (SDSU) shared results of evaluation of a subset of germplasms, including data on biomass production, soil microbiome, and water use efficiency. 

Obj. 1.2 – Cover crop breeding and evaluation

The first year of an on-farm participatory variety trial was conducted from August 2024 to June 2025, focused on winter peas for cover cropping and including 69 trial participants in the northern US and Canada. Moore (Cornell) shared an overview of the trial design, materials shared with farmers, and preliminary results from the trial. The trial will be conducted again in 2025-2026, and collaborators should reach out to Moore to participate and share information about the trial with interested farmers.

Tilhou (USDA ARS) has initiated a project on faba bean breeding for cover crop use. Collaborators should reach out if interested.

Obj. 1.3 – Objective participants not present.

Obj. 1.4 – Forage grass breeding

This project includes breeding nurseries for several forage grass species at locations including Saskatchewan, Utah, and Quebec, with breeding material exchanged among locations. Canadian collaborators received additional funding from the Beef Cattle Research Council of Canada. Biligetu (University of Saskatchewan) released a tall fescue variety with improved winter hardiness in the past year, and is also working on winter hardiness in orchardgrass, with an anticipated publication related to associated chemical changes and RNAseq data. Robins (USDA ARS) plans to conduct another cycle of selection and anticipates another one or two papers related to this project.

Phillips (University of Kentucky) described challenges with grass performance for equine industry uses in Kentucky. He is interested in wide crosses between Kentucky bluegrass and the more heat/drought tolerant Texas bluegrass, as well as in orchardgrass and meadow bromegrass.

Obj. 1.5 – Birdsfoot trefoil

Evaluation of birdsfoot trefoil material for agronomic production and chemical profile, with a focus on condensed tannins (CTs), has been completed. There is clear variation for CTs and other compounds, including strong genotype-by-environment (GxE) effects. Popodopoulos (AAFC) is in the process of publishing these data. Glover (AAFC) is conducting a grazing trial to evaluate the effect of CTs on nematodes.

Obj. 1.6 – Objective participants not present.

Obj. 1.7 – Breeding for intercropping

Collaborators have several ongoing activities in this topic area, including selection and evaluation of alfalfa intercropped with corn, intermediate wheatgrass, and forage mixtures. The group discussed opportunities to coordinate these activities in future, and additional collaborators (e.g., Asselin (AAFC)) expressed interest in participating in these activities as well.

Obj. 2 – GxE evaluation

Missauoi (University of Georgia) completed analysis of the coordinated grass trial and is currently writing up the manuscript to be circulated to collaborators.

Possible new objectives:

Missauoi and others interested in exploring new projects to share materials and coordinate evaluation of resistance to cold and heat stress and their underlying mechanisms.

Project logistics:

The next meeting will take place in St. Paul, MN in coordination with the North American Alfalfa Improvement Conference (NAAIC), sometime in June 2026. Morrison (Mississippi State University) will be the chair. Moore (Cornell) will serve as secretary and will host the meeting in Ithaca, NY in 2027.

Tour on 6/10/25 toured forage variety trials, Kernza breeding, and living mulch plots at the University of Kentucky research farm.

Short-term Outcomes: Major short-term outcomes include germplasm exchange among the major forage breeding programs in North America, and the release of new cultivars for adoption by farmers.

Outputs: In the past year, project outputs have included six publications related to forage and cover crop breeding, presentations at field days, and at academic and industry conferences, and release of a cultivar of tall fescue.

Activities: In the past year, activities were conducted related to breeding and variety evaluation of alfalfa, birdsfoot trefoil, several forage grass species, and several cover crop species including cereal rye, crimson clover, hairy vetch, winter canola, and winter pea. Activities included planting, data collection, selection, biomass and seed harvest, DNA sequencing, and data analysis. A participatory variety trial was also conducted, and activities included trial design, participant recruitment and training, data collection, and analysis. Results for multiple research projects were submitted for publication.

Milestones: In the next year, major milestones include public release of alfalfa germplasm pools, sequencing 4,000 alfalfa accessions, and publishing results from several of the project objectives.

Kissing Kucek, L., K. Muller, L.B. Martins, V. Moore, S.C. Reberg-Horton, S.B. Mirsky, J. Englert, L. Drinkwater, J.L. Douglas, S. Seehaver, T. Butler, M. Ryan, A. Casey, K.M. Clark, N.J. Ehlke, J.R. Hendrickson, J.A. Guretzky, H. Johnson, D.W. Archer, R.J. McGee, S. Ali, A. Bartow, V. Bullard, A. Burke, R. Barrett, C. Berneau, B. Carr, R. Crawford, K. Griffin, E. Henriquez Inoa, H. Hillhouse, M. Humphrey, M. Smither-Kopperl, S. Krogman, S. Lee, A. Marion, N. McGhee, I. Silvernail, P. Thevar, S. Wayman, N. Wiering, D. Wiggans, and H. Riday. 2024. Genetic and Environmental Drivers of Legume Cover Crop Performance: Hairy vetch. Crop Science 64(6): 3052-3072. doi: 10.1002/csc2.21318

Medina, C.A., D. Zhao, M. Lin, M. Sapkota, A.M. Sandercock, C.T. Beil, M.J. Sheehan, B.M. Irish, L.X. Yu, H. Poudel, A. Claessens, V. Moore, J. Crawford, J. Hansen, D. Viands, M.D. Peel, N. Tilhou, H. Riday, E.C. Brummer, and Z. Xu. 2025. Pre-breeding in alfalfa germplasm develops highly differentiated populations, as revealed by genome-wide microhaplotype markers. Scientific Reports 15(1): 1253. doi: 10.1038/s41598-024-84262-x.

Solihu Kayode Sakariyahu, Tim McDowell, Justin Renaud, Yousef Papadopoulos, Kathleen Glover, Rebecca Brown, Michael D. Peel, Heathcliffe Riday, Susanne Kohalmi, Abdelali Hannoufa. 2025. Profiling environmental and seasonal variations in condensed tannins and metabolites of birdsfoot trefoil (Lotus corniculatus L.) cultivars. Genes, in review.

Thapa, R., S. Hanson, J. Hua, and V.M. Moore. 2025. Breeding for cold tolerance in common annual legume cover crops. Crop Science 65(3). doi: 10.1002/csc2.70059

Tilhou, N., L. Kissing Kucek, V. Moore, S. Hanson, S.C. Reberg-Horton, M. Ryan, N.J. Ehlke, A. Bartow, B. Carr, J. Douglas, J. Englert, J. Raasch, A. Woodard, J. Crawford, R. Crawford, S. Ali, S. Bhamidimarri, S.B. Mirsky, M. Monteros, G. Moore, A. Gamble, N. Rajan, S. Narayanan, E. Haramoto, N. Basinger, V. Sykes, A. McWhirt, M. Reiter, and H. Riday. 2025. Hairy vetch (Vicia villosa Roth) germplasm contains a cryptic second species (Vicia varia Host). Crop Science 65(1). doi: 10.1002/csc2.21455

Tilhou, N., L. Kissing Kucek, V. Moore, S. Hanson, S.C. Reberg-Horton, M.R. Ryan, N. Ehlke, A. Bartow, B. Carr, J. Douglas, J. Englert, J. Crawford, R. Crawford, S. Ali, S. Bhamidimarri, S. Mirsky, M.J. Monteros, R. Hayes, and H. Riday. 2024. Seed size has a major impact on fall seedling vigor in the cover crop hairy vetch (Vicia villosa Roth). Crop Science 65(1). doi: 10.1002/csc2.21439