Breeder Puts Forward Road Map of Future Trends

Blueberry growers will pay more for seedlings in the years ahead, work under more licensing agreements and grow a better quality of berry, said Michael Dossett, a research scientist and breeder for BC Berry Cultivar Development in British Columbia.

Michael Dossett

Speaking at the USHBC Virtual Conference and Expo on September 30, Dossett, who holds a Ph.D. in horticulture from Oregon State University, said that an influx of berry cultivars being released for production in recent years will continue and that superior genetics is what will differentiate one grower’s fruit from another’s.

“The breeding landscape is extremely competitive right now,” Dossett said. “You see that in the number of cultivars that have come out the last two years and that trend is only going to increase.

“Growers are going to have an array of choices,” he said. “And licensing options for all of these are going to be more complex and probably more expensive. Breeding is not cheap.”

Dossett noted that breeding programs are putting out thousands of plants a year, if not ten-thousand-plus. “I know some breeding programs are putting out as many as 20,000 or more seedlings every year. And it takes a lot of time and resources to go through and collect information on those and screen stuff,” he said.

“There is also added cost because of molecular improvements,” he said. “Blueberries have a very complex genome, so marker assisted breeding, to be able to know or have an idea of the potential of what we are going to plant out and look at, is really important for being able to make progress on these down the road. And that comes with a cost.”

Breeding programs largely are focused on quality these days, Dossett said, and probably the most important attribute that breeders are emphasizing is firmness. “Size is also being emphasized,” he said. “And it is nice to see flavor emphasized more and more. I would say in the current marketplace, flavor is important as long as you reach a baseline threshold of acceptability.

“I think that down the road, as there are more and more (cultivars) in the marketplace for people to choose from, that acceptability is going to shift and we are going to need better and better flavored varieties to be able to keep the markets for our fruit,” he said.

Breeding programs also are focused on the grower revenue side of the equation, he said. Whether that means better yield, less disease susceptibility, labor savings through machine harvestability or possibly a growth habit that makes it less expensive to prune, these are attributes breeders look for in a variety, he said.

Dossett noted that varieties widely planted today all have some shortcomings and that probably will always be the case. “As much as breeders would like to say that their varieties are perfect, I think all of us that are really involved in this realize that breeding is a game of moving goalposts,” he said. “There is always room for improvement. And I think it is going to remain that way. So, there is tremendous room for improvement in varieties of all chill levels.”

He added that as the number of cultivars available for growers to choose from continues to increase, being able to select ones that grow well on your farm is increasingly important.

“What I would encourage every grower to do is dedicate some space on their farm to planting and testing new material,” Dossett said. “Call the nurseries every year or every couple of years, try to get trial numbers of plants so you can see what is going to work on your farm and what won’t. And the nurseries hopefully will provide you some support in giving you information that you need to be successful with those varieties.

“At the end of the day, if it doesn’t work on your farm and in your production and management system, it is not something that you should plant,” he said. “So, I think growers should be prepared to try to evaluate new materials that come out, so when they are ready to turn over acreage or expand, they have a game plan. As there are more and more options available to growers down the road, that is going to be even more critical.”