US Nicotiana Germplasm Collection 2013 Nursery

[AmaxB]

Helps you value the work done to keep and provide seed....

 

[NRustica]

Awesome! I'm impressed. Do you all get federal funding? Who do I need to write to make sure it is appreciated and continued?

 

[JessicaNicot]

Do you ever find bud worms inside the professional seed bags?

yeah- I do find worms in them sometimes. I believe it happens because sometimes they may not get sprayed very well with the tracer (usually someone does this step for me so I try not to complain because its nice to get a little help). yesterday I was out harvesting seed and in several bags I found live moths. the worms had already morphed. I very much dislike the worms because they ruin the seed. I cut off any capsules that have holes bored into them while im harvesting because odds are they're just full off useless worm poo, which only makes the seed more difficult to clean.

 

[JessicaNicot]

Awesome! I'm impressed. Do you all get federal funding? Who do I need to write to make sure it is appreciated and continued?

unfortunately our program receives zilch from the feds. while the collection was unavailable on GRIN there was a campaign trying to get some movement on that issue-- to maybe get the usda to resume funding for the tobacco germplasm collection which was inadvertently cut along with all fed money to tobacco a couple decades ago. everyone realizes the collection is important (and they certainly got a lot of negative feedback when it was no longer available), but with all the stupid budget deficit hawks in Washington, it will likely never regain usda funding (and in retrospect im kinda glad about this option failing, otherwise id be coming up with some sort of shutdown plan right now). currently the program rests entirely upon the benevolence of members of the tobacco industry. they support my salary and all sorts of aspects regarding maintenance of the collection. we basically use slush funds for distribution.

 

[Knucklehead]

Do you take small donations and how would that be done? I like seeing the doors open over there. Paypal would be good for us peons. Perhaps a Donate button on the new GRIN Global site?

 

[NRustica]

Do you take small donations and how would that be done? I like seeing the doors open over there. Paypal would be good for us peons. Perhaps a Donate button on the new GRIN Global site?

That would be a +1

 

[JessicaNicot]

im not sure that would ever happen, but I take personal checks and paypal =D

 

[deluxestogie]

Jessica,
Since GRIN is no longer the Government, you could certainly charge a small payment for seed and postage to requests from non-research individuals.

Bob

 

[JessicaNicot]

Jessica,
Since GRIN is no longer the Government, you could certainly charge a small payment for seed and postage to requests from non-research individuals.

Bob

actually GRIN is still very much the government (eventho its now engaged in an emerging global collaborative program, which for the record will still require public dissemination at no cost in order to participate) and any distribution we do through them has to generally follow their rules. if we wanted to charge a fee per accession for example, we would need to set up our own database platform, distribution website and order system. and then the university would probably siphon off most of our incoming funds anyway and re-appropriate them elsewhere.

 

[NRustica]

You're part of the gov't, but don't receive gov't funding?

 

[JessicaNicot]

You're part of the gov't, but don't receive gov't funding?

our collection works in collaboration with GRIN/NPGS, as do several others im learning (altho I don't know their funding situations). the collection was looked after by the USDA as recently as the 1980s (maybe later) but when the gov pulled out of tobacco research, funding for the germplasm was also abandoned. it was looked after by the state/university for a while (mainly in terms of staff) but after the last round of budget cuts a couple years ago they short-sightedly canned the previous full time curator (im not sure they understood what he was doing). now its running on soft money from industry and im the part time curator (and the rest of the time im tending to whatever else is needed in the breeding program).

 

[JessicaNicot]

ok guys, so yesterday was the official last day of my field season for 2013! I harvested seed from my last plot.

now begins the fun of shelling. thankfully we still pay the previous curator to do this, otherwise it'd take me all winter long to get thru it all. im hoping to go see him do it this year so I can see his method. i'll try to remember to take some pics if I go. then after that will come the filing away of the new seed into the vials.

ive also seeded up about 35 "stragglers" for the greenhouse this winter- accessions which have fallen thru the cracks and not been amplified in a long time, short day mammoth varieties, and some that just don't set seed in the field without the aid of pollinators. (much to my chagrin, I found a plot yesterday that didn't set a single capsule among 4 bagged heads.)

 

[skychaser]

now begins the fun of shelling. thankfully we still pay the previous curator to do this, otherwise it'd take me all winter long to get thru it all. im hoping to go see him do it this year so I can see his method.

Bah, 6-8 hours a day for a month and you'd be done. Nothing to it. lol

We just started harvesting our tobacco seed. We clip all the heads and they go into 18 gallon totes now to finish drying. When its bone dry, it goes into our home made thresher to break up the seed pods and then through multiple screenings, and finally winnowing. Hardly any work at all. :?

Most of our flower seed is done now. A couple to go. About 1/2 the vegetable seed is done. Doing cucumbers and melons the last couple days. And lots of lettuce. We'll have just about everything else done before we start cleaning all the tobacco seed. It's best done outside. The chaff and dust can be horrible on some varieties to breath. Dust masks required.

I had Izmir that didn't set any seed one year. About half the plants were bagged and half open pollinated. The pods were small but otherwise looked normal, but there wasn't a seed in any of them. Never figured out why. Everything else we had did fine. We grew the same Izmir from the same seed the next year (along with seed from a second source) and got copious amounts of seed from both. The no Izmir seed year is still a mystery to us. ??

 

[istanbulin]

...
I had Izmir that didn't set any seed one year. About half the plants were bagged and half open pollinated. The pods were small but otherwise looked normal, but there wasn't a seed in any of them. Never figured out why. Everything else we had did fine. We grew the same Izmir from the same seed the next year (along with seed from a second source) and got copious amounts of seed from both. The no Izmir seed year is still a mystery to us. ??

I got same problem last year with TN90, seeds were from a reliable source, they were not hybrid or anything like that. This problem may occur in different conditions. For example, temperature is very important. Lower temperatures (10 [SUP]o[/SUP]C or below) decrease the vitality of the pollen. So when the pistil is ready for pollination there may be no vital pollen around. Timing is important for plants too. There're some other conditions dependent on flower like; sterile stamen, immature pistil, etc.

 

[JessicaNicot]

I had Izmir that didn't set any seed one year. About half the plants were bagged and half open pollinated. The pods were small but otherwise looked normal, but there wasn't a seed in any of them. Never figured out why. Everything else we had did fine. We grew the same Izmir from the same seed the next year (along with seed from a second source) and got copious amounts of seed from both. The no Izmir seed year is still a mystery to us. ??

I would check your pollen. one of the oriental varieties I had in the greenhouse earlier this year had really terrible pollen and it was difficult to even manually self pollinate.

have you ever had any trouble with your One Sucker in the field? I don't know if it was the weather or what, but mine didn't set very many capsules and it was no longer in flower when I harvested the heads so I don't know if floral morphology had anything to do with it.

 

[skychaser]

have you ever had any trouble with your One Sucker in the field? I don't know if it was the weather or what, but mine didn't set very many capsules and it was no longer in flower when I harvested the heads so I don't know if floral morphology had anything to do with it.

I only grew it once. It started to bud very early but the flowers took a long time to mature, and the plants grew a great deal more before they opened. The main heads were sparse and had very few pods. I bagged a lot of suckers that flowered later and ended up with a decent amount of seed in the end, but it is not a heavy seed producer. I checked to see if I had any photos of the flowers or seed heads but every plant in the photos I have is bagged and you can't tell what they looked like.

 

[skychaser]

Hey Jessica I have a couple questions for you.

Do you know if there are federal minimum germination standards for heirloom tobaccos? I have found listings for most flowers, vegetables, ornamental nicotianas, and for certified seed. But nothing that specifically lists other tobaccos varieties.

Can photos from the grin site be used by others if the source is credited? I am missing photos for a half dozen varieties.

 

[JessicaNicot]

to the best of my knowledge, there isn't a standard on germination, but I assume good practices would dictate over 90% (altho im sure this would be too low for commercial pelleted tobacco seed which would probably be more like 98%). germination rate fluctuates with time so its hard to pin down. some varieties go up over time (possibly a mild dormancy period) and most go down slowly.

the GRIN photos are in the public realm and can be used freely by anyone (altho the credit would be nice). I took most of them (not the ones where there is a white board though). this year I will be experimenting with taking detached mid-stalk leaf photos and maybe some detached flowers.

 

[skychaser]

Certified seed requires a minimum of 85% I don't know about pelleted, but I agree it must be at least 90% or better. I have never had a germ test on tobacco come back over 95%. All my tests are done by the WSDA lab in Yakima WA. I have had lots come in over 90%, but the highest we ever got was 98% and it was on melon seed. The fed's germination standards for flowers and vegetables sold at retail range from as low as 40% to a high of 80%, depending on the plant. The vast majority are between 65% and 75%. States may have different standards too requiring higher germ rates. I know Californian does. Our buyer in California requires a good 10 points higher than the fed's standards. He also told me that their seed must be re-tested every 15 months if it is held over in stock.

 

[khoaibong2422]

hi all. Iam new member. hope to improve my knowkledge about tobacco germplasm with you