UGA pumpkin variety grows well for Georgia farmers

Heading to a local pumpkin patch to pick the season’s best is a time-honored fall family activity. Thanks to University of Georgia researchers, a better, Georgia-specific pumpkin is available for carving or baking.

"Most of the pumpkins traditionally grown commercially in Georgia are Cucurbita pepo types," said George Boyhan, a horticulturist with the UGA College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences. "They're in the same species as summer squash. And they're highly susceptible to viruses and other foliar diseases."

Even with an aggressive program to control tiny insect pests called aphids, aphid-transmitted viruses can quickly devastate the crop, he said, at times resulting in complete loss.

But Orange Bulldog is not so weak on the vine. The improved variety -- developed from germplasm collected in the jungles of South America – has greater levels of resistance to viruses than conventional pumpkins.

When Boyhan and retired CAES horticulturists Gerard Krewer and Darbie Granberry began working with the jungle seed, they discovered long, flat pumpkins, or ones not easily carved into jack-o’-lanterns.

The team worked to develop a more disease-resistant variety with a good jack-o’-lantern shape that’s adapted to Georgia’s climate. Orange Bulldog debuted in 2004.

It consistently yields 13,000 pounds to 20,000 pound per acre in northern and southern Georgia. Boyhan is now working to develop a variety with more uniformity in shape and color but with the same disease resistance as Orange Bulldog.

“The goal of the variety was to produce a pumpkin with higher levels of disease resistance,” he said. “So, it lends itself to organic farming where herbicides and fungicides are limited to a few organic compounds. We are looking at small growers and farmers markets and organic fruit seems to fit there.”

Organic seeds for Orange Bulldog will be available for next year’s crop.

The pumpkin variety has a considerable amount of variability, something shoppers at roadside stands and pick-your-own farms find appealing.

“People really like the variation of the pumpkin, they can use it for variety in decorating,” said Raymond Joyce, the UGA Cooperative Extension coordinator in Laurens County.

T&T Farms, a pick-your-own farm in Dudley, added an agritourism activity for school groups as well as an additional fall crop when they planted three-acres of Orange Bulldog this year. Joyce said he was surprised to see how well the pumpkin did in the field. It was grown without irrigation and had to be sprayed only once with a fungicide and then once with a herbicide.

“We had planted pumpkins in the past, but they always grew out too soon and never did too good,” said Nancy Tomlinson, owner of T&T Farms. “The neat thing about these pumpkins is they are all different. Some are long. Others are squatty. The color varies from light-yellow to bronze or deep orange. And some have green mingled in. It is neat to watch the variation in size, shape and color all come off the same vine.”

Having a successful pumpkin crop meant more business to the family farm this season. So did adding a corn maze and hayrides.

Apart from looking good, Orange Bulldog tastes good, too. In its immature state, it is bright yellow and can be prepared and eaten like summer squash. It’s particularly good sautéed with Vidalia onions, Boyhan said. The meat of a mature pumpkin can be cubed and cooked to make pumpkin pie filling.

“I’ve used it in cakes, pies and candy and cooked it like squash. You name it, we’ve tried it,” Tomlinson said.

To find pick-your-own pumpkin and other fruit or vegetable patches in your area, visit the Georgia Market Maker Web site at ga.marketmaker.uiuc.edu.

By April Sorrow
University of Georgia

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Fighting Reveals Lack of Genetic Connection

University of Georgia scientists are using DNA technology and old-fashioned animal instinct to find the best ways to control wood-destroying carpenter ants.

“Carpenter ants are a major pest problem nationwide,” said Dan Suiter, an entomologist with the UGA College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences. “They cause significant damage each year.”

Wood-chewers

Unlike termites, carpenter ants don’t eat wood. They chew it. “They expand it into a nest gallery that looks like Swiss cheese,” Suiter said. “Then they live in the galleries.”

Carpenter ants are big and black and live mostly in trees, he said. In the Northeast, carpenter ants destroy more wood than termites.

Based on the UGA Griffin, Ga., campus, Suiter and CAES genetic entomologist Tracie Jenkins test baits designed to kill the ants. They are monitoring 20 sites in the local city park because the hardwood trees there replicate those found in a typical suburban neighborhood.

They monitor the test sites at night when the ants forage for food.

Huge and nocturnal

“During the day, they live up in the leaves and in hollowed-out tree holes and knotholes,” Jenkins said. “At night, they come down, and you can literally see the well-worn foraging trails they habitually use.”

Ant samples are taken from the park back to the laboratory where Jenkins uses DNA biotechnology to determine the ants’ lineage or family relationships, which form colony structure.

“We assume each colony has a single queen, so knowing the queen’s maternal fingerprint will help us track her progenies’ movements,” she said. “The winged ants are the ones that mate. We’ve discovered colonies that are physically far apart can actually be descended from the same female queen.”

Once a colony’s genetic structure and movements are known, Suiter and Jenkins can develop management strategies and determine which baits are effective.

Families don't fight

To find out if colonies are related, Suiter said, you can also do what he calls “ant behavioral studies.”

He places ants from different sites in a Petri dish. The ants that fight each other are not related.
“The ants have colony-specific smells on their bodies,” Suiter said.

Ants pick fights by using their antennae to spar, he said. Then it gets aggressive.

“They grab each other by a leg, and one will take another’s leg off,” he said. “Then they lock jaws and do a circle-dance.”
Deadly acid

Then somebody bring out the heavy artillery.

“Carpenter ants can spray formic acid,” Suiter said. “So, the first one to turn around and spray formic acid is the winner. It’s like getting a face full of tear gas, and they have to be very irritated to do it.”

After six months have passed, Suiter and Jenkins will return to the test sites at the park. If they find ants, they will again take samples and run DNA analyses to determine if the ants are from the same colony that initially occupied the site.

“We want to eliminate the ants in a colony by using the baits, then go back and see if the ants that come back are from the same colony,” he said. “To truly know how well the baits work, we have to know if the same colony of ants or a different colony move in after we eliminate the first colony.”

To see carpenter ants, go outside after 9 p.m. armed with a flash light. “You may see a couple in the daytime, but you’ll see hundreds if not thousands at night,” Suiter said.

By Sharon Dowdy
University of Georgia

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Manure Info, Anyone?

Animal Manure Management Finds Internet Home

The University of Georgia and its partner universities and organizations are using new media to help get the word out about solutions to a long-time issue – animal manure. They’ve combined resources and given animal manure management a home on the Internet.

The United States Department of Agriculture estimates that, nationwide, 257,000 livestock and poultry operations on 15 million acres of cropland need plans to manage their 780 million tons of animal manure.

To help deal with the manure challenge, UGA professor Mark Risse and his colleagues from universities in Washington and Nebraska created the online Livestock and Poultry Environmental Learning Center, now housed on eXtension’s Web site (www.extension.org).

eXtension is a nationwide clearinghouse of research-based information on topics ranging from animal manure to financial crisis to science, engineering and technology for youth. Land-grant universities across the nation, including UGA, contribute scientific information to the site.

“As we get fewer and fewer resources, we’ve got to be able to work together like this,” said Mark Risse, a UGA Cooperative Extension engineer and animal waste specialist.

The Livestock and Poultry Environmental Learning Center is designed for one-stop shopping on issues surrounding animal manure. Risse’s goal is to help people indirectly involved in animal manure, whether they deal with policy issues, help animal producers or deliver technical services – and whether they live in Alaska or Florida.

Currently, the site averages 10,000 to 20,000 hits a month, and 2,000 people subscribe to the monthly newsletter.

Of the 200 to 400 people who listen to their monthly webcasts, each in turn helps about 200 producers each year. That brings the Web site’s impact, through those listeners, to between 40,000 and 80,000 people annually.

The number of hits the site gets doesn’t equal success for Risse.

“I’m less concerned with numbers,” he said. “Success is that people are finding what they want on our site.”

So far, people are finding what they need, and they’re asking for more.

The Web site’s reach stretches internationally, too. That was something Risse hadn’t considered, but it isn’t what amazes him most.

“Our biggest surprise is the Environmental Protection Agency and policymakers make up 25 percent to 30 percent of the audience for our webcasts,” Risse said. “Our stakeholders find that very good, because they know and trust the information on our site.”

The EPA and others aren’t just listening in. They’re using the center to distribute information. The EPA approached the center about doing a webcast in December. That session had their “highest attendance ever,” Risse said. As the EPA discussed its new regulations for confined animal feeding options, 400 people listened.

Risse and his colleagues use both webcasts and research briefs to address issues and deliver answers to problems livestock producers may have. They pull from their own research or from expertise from the nation’s top animal specialists. They also have databases of “Frequently Asked Questions” and an “Ask the Expert” platform on the Web site.

The site prides itself on “connecting experts with those [who] need the information. Animal producers are getting information from the person in the country who knows the most about it,” Risse said.

For more information on the Livestock and Poultry Environmental Learning Center’s Web site, visit www.extension.org and click on the Livestock and Poultry Learning Center link.

By Stephanie Schupska
University of Georgia

Stephanie Schupska is a news editor with the University of Georgia College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences.

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Cold Snaps Landscapes

Recent freezing temperatures have taken a toll on some Georgia landscapes. If you were too slow to mulch or to cover tender plants, you may now see wilted, dark leaves dotting your flower beds. A University of Georgia expert has advice on how to handle the damage and to avoid it.
“On these first several frosts you are going to see obvious frost damage because many plants haven’t dropped their leaves,” said Bob Westerfield, a UGA Cooperative Extension horticulturist. “The damage will usually appear as brown tips on leaves that will then turn black. Just go a couple of inches below the damage and prune it out.”

If you have planted wisely, the damage should only be temporary.

“Most plants that are established and have been in the landscape a year or two will survive these cold snaps,” he said. “You might have to prune out the damage, but they will make it through.”

If leaf burn is severe and unsightly, go ahead and cut it back. The plants won’t produce more leaves now. But since this is only the first cold snap and not the last, he said, you can wait to prune “because we will get hit again, and you can prune it back harder in December or January.”

Feed and water

Plants still need plenty of moisture now, he said. “Plants need that pressure within their stems to withstand the cold. If you don’t have them fully moist they can’t withstand the cold and will get cell damage. Now is the time to wet them down really well before a cold night.”
Most winter annuals will survive fine with proper care. “Most annuals like mums and pansies are very tenacious,” he said. “They might look bad right after the cold, but they will come right out of it.”

Good nutrition helps, too. “Give them some liquid or light granular fertilizer once a month and water well throughout the season,” he said. “They have limited root systems, so they need plenty of food and water.”

Protect plants

Annuals and shrubs need some protection against the cold.

“Some really sensitive plants like hydrangeas or young fig trees need heavy mulch as a blanket of insulation against cold,” he said. “You can get a wire basket, fill it up with leaves and cover the plant to protect it.”

He also recommends making a windscreen from a cardboard box or plastic. But don’t let the plastic touch the plant. It will make the plant colder. If you use plastic, make a tent with it over the plant.

For more tips on protecting landscape plants in winter, call your local UGA Extension agent at 1-800-ASK-UGA1 or look online at www.ugaextension.com .

By Faith Peppers
University of Georgia

Faith Peppers is a news editor for the University of Georgia College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences.

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Soybean Grant Gives Researchers Tools to Unravel Better Bean

For millennia, people have grown soybeans and turned them into many useful products. But when it comes to understanding why a soybean grows, blooms or produces like it does, researchers are left with unanswered questions.

University of Georgia professor Wayne Parrott aims to find the answers with a three-year, $2.5 million grant from the National Science Foundation and a jumping gene in rice found by a UGA colleague.

"I'm convinced that soybeans would be so much more useful and flexible if we knew what genes we need to be working with," said Parrott, a crop and soil sciences professor in the UGA College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences.

The soybean's genome was sequenced, or mapped, earlier this year. Now Parrott and his colleagues from the universities of Nebraska, Missouri-Columbia and Minnesota are taking soybean's genetic map and translating it so that soybean breeders can use it to produce a better bean.

Parrott is using a jumping rice gene for his part of the research. His counterparts are using radiation.

UGA plant biology professor Sue Wessler found the jumping gene in rice. Her discovery is unique. The gene is one of only a few with the ability to cut themselves out of and move to another location in the genome, altering it, Parrott said.

She shared the technology. Parrott's lab will insert the jumping rice gene into soybean plants. When something changes in a plant with the added jumping gene - such as how fast it flowers - they will then search the plant genetically. When they find the jumping gene - presumably in a new location in the genome - they can identify the modified gene there and, in this example, know what caused the plant to bloom faster.

The more genes they identify using the jumping gene technique, the more they'll know about the soybean and what they can do to improve it. The soybean has a few issues that could stand modifying, Parrott said.

On grocery store shelves, soybeans may seem like the perfect plant. It can be made into tofu and its synthetic meat products. However, the bean's protein is not balanced to the 21 amino acids humans need for a healthy diet. In addition, soybean oil contains trans fats after it's processed.

On the agricultural side, an improved soybean variety would allow farmers to plant a crop that produces more soybeans using the same amount of land. And with soybean plants that are disease and insect resistant, farmers wouldn't have to apply as much money - draining pesticides.

Farmers could also grow varieties that produce more oil or more protein.

"Genome sequencing and gene discovery is starting to open a new, exciting era for us," Parrott said.

It's a good time for soybeans. Since 1982, the U.S. has had a 15 percent increase in total soybean production.

"Acreage-wise, soybeans are among the top three crops in the United States," Parrott said. "It's the No. 1 source of vegetable oil and vegetable protein. In that regard, it's the most important of the crops."

Soybeans are used for adhesives, alternative fuels, disinfectants, plastics, salad dressings, particleboard, candy, cookies and swine feed, to name a few. "It just boggles the mind that it lends itself to so many different uses," Parrott said. "It's even in furniture care products."

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Farmers Forced to Leave Tomatoes in Fields

When it comes to food, perceived danger can be as harmful as a real one, especially to a farmer’s wallet. Georgia tomato growers learned that lesson firsthand when consumers stopped buying fresh tomatoes during this summer’s Salmonella scare linked to fresh tomatoes.

In July, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration issued a nationwide warning regarding a Salmonella risk on varieties of raw red plum, red Roma and round red tomatoes.

“The disease wasn’t found on Georgia tomatoes, but the general public’s perception was that all tomatoes were affected,” said Archie Flanders, an economist with the University of Georgia College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences.

The scare cost Georgia farmers $13.9 million. Georgia grows about 3,000 acres of tomatoes, worth between $60 million and $80 million annually.

As president of the Georgia Fruit and Vegetable Growers Association, Bill Brim tried to tell consumers through media interviews that Georgia tomatoes were safe. He ate tomatoes straight from his field on television.

“I was interviewed by (all the major Atlanta television media), and I tried my best to persuade people that Georgia tomatoes are safe,” Brim said. “The national news media really put us under by telling people not to eat any tomatoes unless they have the vine attached. What was so sad was that it wasn’t true.”

Georgia growers weren’t the only ones. “Growers in Tennessee, north Florida, Louisiana, North and South Carolina, and of course California, were all hit hard, too,” he said.

Brim grows 80-acres of tomatoes in Tifton, Ga. The summer scare cost him $1.2 million. “This was a very significant loss for small- and large-scale farmers,” he said.

Tomatoes are one of Brim’s most expensive crops to grow. An acre of tomatoes costs him $12,000. Bell pepper costs $8,000 per acre. Squash costs him $2,500 per acre, he said.

Georgia tomato growers lost $1.6 million from harvested tomatoes that were picked but not sold. Much of the state’s tomato crop wasn’t harvested because there wasn’t a market for them, Flanders said.

“When wholesalers aren’t buying produce, growers know the market is lost,” Flanders said.
To determine the total impact of the scare, Flanders led a survey conducted by the UGA Center for Agribusiness and Economic Development.

Most Georgia tomatoes are grown in nine southwestern counties and one county in northeast Georgia. Farmers there were surveyed by UGA Cooperative Extension agents.

The survey revealed that 32 percent of Georgia’s tomato acreage was left in the field due to decrease demand caused by the scare, Flanders said. Another 9 percent was lost to discarded harvested and packed tomatoes due to decreased demand.

Before the scare, Brim’s tomatoes were bringing $19 a box. Three days after the FDA warning, the same tomatoes dropped to $4 a box. A box costs him $8 to grow. That doesn’t include the packing cost.

“All the food chains and grocery chains quit taking them,” he said. “I dumped 30 percent of our crop and left 30 percent in the field. It was heartbreaking. … You do an excellent job growing it, and then you don’t have a market to sell it. You just have to leave it to rot.”

Each year, Georgia has two tomato crops, one harvested in summer and one in fall.

Brim is now harvesting 40 acres. Prices are still.

“I think there are going to be more and more people getting out of the tomato business because the market was just declined,” Brim said. “We just hope the market will turn around and consumers will get the confidence back. I stand behind the fact that Georgia-grown produce is the safest food in the world.”

By Sharon Dowdy
University of Georgia

Sharon Dowdy is a news editor with the University of Georgia College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences.

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Today's Pumpkins Not Just Basketballs

Whether you’re planning to carve a Halloween pumpkin or create a fall decoration, chances are pumpkin shopping is on your to-do list.

“The traditional, basketball-sized, orange fruit is still out there, but neither size nor color is an obstacle anymore,” said Terry Kelley, a University of Georgia Cooperative Extension horticulturist. “While orange is still the norm, the market offers white, bluish-gray, buff or even red pumpkins, too.”

If you’re a traditionalist, Kelley recommends the deep burnt orange color of a Magic Lantern or the light orange of an Old Zeb's. If your goal is to carve a jack-o'-lantern, stay in the 8- to 20-pound range.

If you like trying something new and thinking outside the box, why not try a white or blue pumpkin?

The traditional Lumina variety is the standard white pumpkin that grows from 5 to 12 pounds. Cotton Candy is another of similar size.

If you're looking for a mini, Baby Boo is a small, white pumpkin. If you want to go toward the giant side, try Full Moon, one of the newest pumpkins on the market. It is a white-skinned variety that can easily grow to 80 pounds.

Jarrahdale is a grayish blue pumpkin that's deeply ribbed and somewhat flat. Despite its unique outside color, it's just as orange as any jack-o'-lantern on the inside. Most of the white varieties are orange on the inside, too.

Fairytale and Cinderella are flat, scalloped varieties with glossy skin in buckskin and deep orange. Red Eye is almost red and has veins of white running through the red background. One Too Many has the opposite color scheme.

“If you want a behemoth, pick from one of the giant varieties like Dill's Atlantic Giant,” Kelley said. “Finding these fruits from 300 to 600 pounds is not uncommon. The world record is around 1,200 pounds.”

You don't have to stick with orange giants, either. White pumpkins and other varieties range in size from a bushel basket to a small automobile, he said.

For decorating, a plethora of miniature types come in all colors, too, from orange to white to mixed. Kelley says true miniature pumpkins weigh a pound or less.

Gold Dust and Jack-Be-Little are just two of the many miniature varieties that come in orange. Cannonball, Ironman and Li'l Ironsides grow in the 2- to 5-pound range.

There are still more varieties to choose from like the striped minis Li'l Pump-Ke-Mon and Hooligan.

By the time you pick the perfect pumpkin for decorating, it will be time to pick the perfect variety for holiday pie making.

By Sharon Dowdy
University of Georgia

Sharon Dowdy is a news editor with the University of Georgia College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences.

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UGA Odum School Researcher Creates Tool Demonstrating Profitability of Organic Farming

Research at the Agroecology Laboratory at the UGA Odum School of Ecology has led to the creation of organic farming enterprise budgets. Prior to this development, the economic decision-making tool used to estimate profitability was not widely available for organic production.

“Centuries of extensive tillage to produce crops like tobacco and cotton have caused much of our native topsoil to be washed into rivers,” said Krista Jacobsen, a recent Odum School Ph.D. graduate. “Many farmers in the Southeast inherit these degraded soils and it is important to develop and study farming practices that can restore soil and allow it to be farmed profitably at the same time. That’s where enterprise budgets come in.”

Until Jacobsen’s innovation, only one set of budgets for a limited number of organic crops had been developed for the Southeastern U.S. Now, budgets for okra, hot peppers and a corn/winter squash mix are available – providing organic farmers with one of the only organic conservation tillage budgets in the country.

“Conservation tillage is the practice of reducing tillage on farming systems and leaving at least 30 percent of crop residues on the soil surface,” explained Jacobsen. “My research demonstrates that using this practice outperforms a conventional system that uses regular tillage and chemical fertilizers in degraded soils like those of the Georgia Piedmont.”

According to Jacobsen’s advisor Carl Jordan, there is overwhelming evidence that organic agriculture is more sustainable than industrial agriculture. Organic agriculture improves the soil, reduces pollution from fertilizers and helps agriculture-friendly insects. The big question, therefore, is determining if organic agriculture can be economically competitive.

“Krista’s research at Spring Valley EcoFarms in Athens has shown that while yield from organically managed fields often is slightly less than from industrial cropland, energy-intensive inputs such as nitrogen fertilizer, pesticides and tractor fuel is much less,” said Jordan, senior research associate at the Odum School of Ecology. “As a result, input costs are less and profit margins can be higher. Low energy costs are especially important in these days of surging petroleum prices.”

For more information on Spring Valley EcoFarms, see www.springvalleyecofarms.org.

With roots that date back to the 1950s, the UGA Odum School of Ecology offers undergraduate and graduate degrees, as well as a certification program. Founder Eugene P. Odum is recognized internationally as a pioneer of ecosystem ecology. The school is ranked tenth by U.S. News and World Report for its graduate program. The Odum School is the first standalone school of ecology in the world. For more information, see http://www.ecology.uga.edu.

By Anisa S. Jimenez
University of Georgia

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