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Pecan research is a waiting game
By Doug Rich
All good things come to those who wait is an American idiom made popular by poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, but it could well have been penned by a pecan researcher. Pecans are a longterm investment for growers starting an orchard from scratch and even more of a longterm investment for researchers.
When Bill Reid took over as director of the Kansas State University Pecan Experiment Field in Chetopa, Kans., his first research project was designed to run for 70 years. Reid's original research dealt with northern cultivars. "There had never been a study of northern cultivars anywhere in the country that lasted over 20 years," says Reid. "We needed to have some baseline data."
The primary focus of research at the Chetopa experiment field is the evaluation of northern improved varieties and improving native pecan production. "Most of the production in Kansas and Missouri is from natives," says Reid. He is one of the few researchers in the country that still does research for native growers. Oklahoma, Texas, and Louisiana still have a large number of native trees in production but their research seems to be focused on the planted orchard. "Most of my time in Extension work is spent helping native producers." Reid's Extension work is unique because he is on the University of Missouri Extension staff, as well. Bill Reid spends about 60 percent of his time on research, 40 percent on Extension work and approximately 10 percent of his Extension work is funded by the University of Missouri.
There is one breeding program for pecans nationwide and the Pecan Experiment Field at Chetopa does advanced testing for that program. "We have released one variety from that partnership with USDA," says Reid. "One cultivar that has become popular in Kansas, Oklahoma, and Missouri." That variety is Kanza, a cross between Major and Shoshoni with high productivity, disease resistance, cold tolerance, and annual bearing. "Kanza is a very good variety for this part of the world. It ripens early and is scab resistant. No disease control is necessary so that really cuts product costs." Kanza was released in 1996.
"Most people don't realize how long it takes to develop these cultivars."
"Most people don't realize how long it takes to develop these cultivars," says Bill Reid. Before it was released under the name of Kanza, this variety was identified by the number 55-11-11. The '55' means that it was bred in 1955. The first '11' tells researchers that it is a variety between Major and Shoshoni. The second '11' denotes that it was the eleventh tree in the row. This cultivar was bred in 1955 and not released until 41 years later. After the cross is made the tree is grown and evaluated for 13 years. "It needs to produce within that 13 year period to have enough nuts to evaluate," says Reid. When that occurs, the variety is sent out to numerous locations around the country where it is grafted and takes another 15 years to have enough production data for an accurate evaluation. "We need to look at it for a long time because it is a long lived crop," says Bill Reid. "In a man's career, if he breeds a new variety when he starts it might be released by the time he retires."
Pawnee, another popular pecan variety in Kansas, was a virtual racehorse of a variety. It was bred in 1964 and released in 1984. Pawnee produces high quality thin shelled nuts but it is not scab resistant. Reid is just now doing the first thinning of varieties he planted for evaluation twenty years ago. "As trees get larger they need to be thinned or removed," he says. This requires a great deal of replication in research projects to keep enough trees in the study to make it statistically viable.
Not all of their research takes 40 years before they know the results. Reid cooperated with other pecan researchers on a practice for crop load regulation. "Several of these improved varieties will put on to many nuts some years," he says. "When this happens the nuts will be smaller, they will not fill out, and the grower ends up with a lot of nuts that are hard to market." When this happens the tree is so stressed it will not return bloom the following year. This means the grower ends up with two years of nothing. The first year there are lots of nuts that are worthless and the next year there are no nuts at all. Annual crops put all of their energy into making seed and then die. Perennial crops divide their resources between seed production and saving enough energy to survive until the next production cycle. Reid and his fellow researchers came up with a way to thin fruit off the tree which solves the problem. They use a tree shaker to remove a portion of the nuts. "This improves the quality of the crop this year and increases the number of blooms next year." Bill Reid and researchers at Oklahoma State University and the University of Georgia developed guidelines for different pecan varieties and different shakers.
The process involves coming into the pecan orchard in early August and removing the extra nut clusters until each terminal branch has one nut cluster on it. "The growers hate the idea of coming in, during the middle of the summer, and knocking nuts off their trees," says Reid. "This has been the biggest revolution in the pecan industry in the last 50 years. It is very important for producers that have improved varieties." The practice has caught on with growers throughout the country and is becoming a standard practice.
"This has been the biggest revolution in the pecan industry in the last 50 years."
Two other research projects at the Pecan Experiment Field involve the monitoring and control of pecan weevils. A Kansas pecan grower, Tom Circle, developed a pecan weevil trap that was tested at the experiment field. "We did the testing to determine how many traps are needed per acre, how many traps are needed per tree, and how big does the tree need to be for the traps to be effective," says Bill Reid. An ongoing research project is looking at different soil types and their effect on weevil emergence. Early research indicates that certain soil types harbor more weevils than others. Weevil larvae burrow down into the soil and emerge two years later as adults. Certain clay type soil make it hard for the weevils to emerge. "We could get to a point where growers will not need to spray the whole orchard for weevils, reducing their cost of production."
Reid says it is beneficial to have a research for pecans located in the middle of an area with a lot of commercial production. Researchers depend on the cooperation of commercial growers to complete many of their studies. "We need a lot of acres to do a study when we have 4 to 5 trees per acres," he says.
All good things do come to those who wait and in this case the good things are improved varieties for growers and better pecans for consumers.
Doug Rich can be reached by phone 785-749-5304 or by e-mail at Richhpj@aol.com.
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