Breeding for yield in Organic Open Source Systems

[William Schlegel]

https://www.iflscience.com/environment/organic-food-is-worse-for-the-climate-than-nonorganic-food/

Here is a link to the latest iteration of a fairly tired argument. It goes something like:

"We have to feed more people, so we need conventional food including GMO's and a complex suite of agrichemicals to feed the world."

However organic agriculture generally has a depressed investment in plant breeding. Can we feed the world with organic agriculture by increasing organic yield through plant breeding? What would it take? How important is yield to you?

[Nicholas Locke]

These "studies" make me laugh! such short sighted lineal minds spend hrs and many $ on these scientific "facts" or sometimes It is just blatant propaganda!
I dont think there is any need for me to rant on about all the things that arent taken into account with this and other "scientific" studies...

[AndrewB]

Traditional average seeds you buy at the store are bred [perhaps] intentionally or unintentionally to rely on heavy inputs of chemical fertilizers, and thus studies like that are not surprising.

I think it can totally be done.

What would it take? Perhaps there might be several types of approaches or focuses.

1.One could take high yielding varieties that have already been bred for such a purpose and just keep growing them over and over in organic or in non-synthetic-fertilizer environments for several generations (3+) and start to adapt them to such conditions.

2. One could take traditional varieties that perform well in such organic or natural environments and cross them with the high yielding varieties,  therefore,  hopefully,  getting high yielding varieties that also gain the traditional organic adapted genetics.

3. One could focus on stress breeding or very poor soil breeding. Those that can adapt highly adaptive root systems may be able to source rare nutrients that traditional varieties can not. One possible example of this might be selecting against Blossom end rot tomatoes or watermelon. Traditional wisdom is just to put more calcium in your soil. But those that can source calcium from deep in the soil on their own may be more advantageous.

4. One can look for those that naturally have better root system genetics and/or leaf area which may help plants grow better, which may help plants produce more. This may or may not be sourced from wild relatives.

[Nicholas Locke]

I have found so far in my short time spent with breeding that I get great yield increases just by a season or to of farmer saved and selected seed saving, with no intentional cross breeding of any sort. But Im sure coupled with intentional crosses Yield potential could be increased even greater. "Organic" farming is such a broad definition, every farmers situation and practices are different. There is a massive void in the organic sector with seed and varieties bred specifically for organic practices. I think a good system to get "organic" yields comparable or greater then conventional is for breeders to "get the bones" of the varieties there for farmers and the rest needs to be farmer selection driven. If farmers dont want to or cant keep there own varities then the next best step is regionally produced seed to have a better yield.

[William Schlegel]

On my grandpa's old wheat farm in North Central Montana he didn't used to fertilize for many years even with modern wheat varieties. He did use broadleaf herbicides like 2-4-D and Dicamba. Late in his career he was plagued a bit by newly arrived annual grasses like Persian Darnel and Barnyard Grass. He used really old equipment and worked the margins by doing really low inputs. He plowed the fallow. He didn't value his time much once he retired from a welding.

His successors who rent the place are set up for no till and they use glyphosate on the fallow. They also fertilize. They get more yields, but they have somewhat higher costs too.

It would be interesting in my opinion to establish a grex of various wheats and allow them to evolve in the field a few generations. Include the modern wheats and the heirlooms, do the same thing with barley, mustard, peas, and anything else that can be dry farmed on 13.8 inches of rain a year.

I think my family would revolt against me though! They think it's too cold, dry, and flat out there. Maybe I can do it as test plots on my 3.25 acres on the west side.

[AndrewB]

It would be interesting in my opinion to establish a grex of various wheats and allow them to evolve in the field a few generations. Include the modern wheats and the heirlooms, do the same thing with barley, mustard, peas, and anything else that can be dry farmed on 13.8 inches of rain a year.

That would be interesting. Though I wonder about the older wheats. On the old forum someone once mentioned a super old rare variety of wheat that people with gluten allergies did not have an allergy to. Apparently the modern wheats are much different. Also the old wheats might be diploid whereas the new ones are hexaploid? Octaploid?

[William Schlegel]

Lots of ploidy levels in wheat. When I took a few classes at Oregon State while my wife was finishing her degree in 2012 I took plant genetics from a Barley Breeder "Pat Hayes- who incidentally pledged a variety of modern Barley to OSSI!" And a plant tissue culture class from a wheat breeder. They spoke of their relative challenges. long story short I would rather breed Barley, wheat is hard! Pat did tell me though that small grains can have relatively high out crossing rates in a grex in certain environmental conditions. So a wheat or barley land race could evolve fairly rapidly.

I bought a packet of Pat's open source Barley from Krista Rome's Resilient Seeds (Backyard Beans and Grains Project) From what he told me though it will not do well for me. I haven't gotten it planted yet anyway.

I actually have quite a bit of Wheat and Barley seed I've grown. I'm curious to grow it out again to see if I can detect any natural hybridization. I planted a single small row in 2017 but it was decimated probably by partridge or pheasants. Didn't get any planted this year.

There are several primitive wheats out there farrow and emmer among them and wild wheat relatives like jointed goat grass. I have a packet of one Triticum monoccocum I think, but I tried once before with seed from bountiful gardens and it didn't germinate for me for some reason. Might have been that I spring planted it in May I used to plant everything in May. Should probably be planted in September? or March.

[Diane Whitehead]

Well, I guess if you're growing field crops you'd want a good yield.  Wheat - reminds me of a summer job I had back in the 1950s as a student assistant at the University of Alberta in Edmonton - lots of variety in what I did, from squishing and counting chromosomes to trawling through the wheat fields pulling out plants afflicted by rust.  I thought surely susceptibility to rust would have been eliminated by now, but apparently not.

But, I'm interested in small-scale vegetables and fruits. Yield doesn't necessarily refer just to a total quantity.  Some varieties are a lot more nutritious than others.  Maybe we should be measuring phytonutrients instead of tonnage.

[Carol Deppe]

"Pat Hayes- who incidentally pledged a variety of modern Barley to OSSI!" And a plant tissue culture class from a wheat breeder. They spoke of their relative challenges. long story short I would rather breed Barley, wheat is hard! Pat did tell me though that small grains can have relatively high out crossing rates in a grex in certain environmental conditions. So a wheat or barley land race could evolve fairly rapidly.

I bought a packet of Pat's open source Barley from Krista Rome's Resilient Seeds (Backyard Beans and Grains Project) From what he told me though it will not do well for me. I haven't gotten it planted yet anyway.

Alas, Pat Hayes barley, Full Pint, is NOT OSSI-Pledged. I notice it is still so listed by Krista Rome/Resilient Seeds. (I've emailed her asking her to make the correction.) Unfortunately, Pat did not get OSU's permission to OSSI-Pledge the variety. He thought it would be okay, as nobody appeared interested in licensing it. However, someone turned up to license it, and OSU IP people did not honor Pat's Pledging of the variety. So OSSI annulled the Pledging of the variety, given that the person who Pledged it was not the owner. OSSI subsequently added signatures for institutional IP departments to make sure this doesn't happen again. So far, of more than 400 varieties, this is the only one whose OSSI-Pledging had to be annulled.

[Carol Deppe]

But, I'm interested in small-scale vegetables and fruits. Yield doesn't necessarily refer just to a total quantity.  Some varieties are a lot more nutritious than others.  Maybe we should be measuring phytonutrients instead of tonnage.

Excellent point. Especially important for winter squash, where the best heirlooms and ops can have considerably high dry matter content--that is, food--than the common commercial hybrids.

[Carol Deppe]

That would be interesting. Though I wonder about the older wheats. On the old forum someone once mentioned a super old rare variety of wheat that people with gluten allergies did not have an allergy to. Apparently the modern wheats are much different. Also the old wheats might be diploid whereas the new ones are hexaploid? Octaploid?

It must be a matter of a particular older variety having less gluten, not none. The gluten creates the multimolecular matrix (with water, time, and kneading) that gives wheat dough the elasticity upon which it's ability to hold the carbon dioxide bubbles produced by yeast depends. No gluten, no elasticity, no rising, no bread.

All wheat and wheat relatives including ancient wheats have gluten. People sometimes talk about breeding gluten-free wheat. Well, if you did that, you couldn't make bread out of it.

[Carol Deppe]

https://www.iflscience.com/environment/organic-food-is-worse-for-the-climate-than-nonorganic-food/

Here is a link to the latest iteration of a fairly tired argument. It goes something like:

"We have to feed more people, so we need conventional food including GMO's and a complex suite of agrichemicals to feed the world."

However organic agriculture generally has a depressed investment in plant breeding. Can we feed the world with organic agriculture by increasing organic yield through plant breeding? What would it take? How important is yield to you?

It's not at all obvious that GMO's give you higher yield. What they do is give you lower labor, but at huge costs in terms of environmental degradation and public health. Atrazine, the herbicide very popular for corn, has been shown to kill or feminize amphibians at field levels. Probably does to people too. Causes breast cancer. Has been banned in Europe.

The yields/labor involved in growing GMOs does not, as far as I know, include the cost of the factories to produce the herbicides, or the huge tractors required for that style of growing corn. Let alone the public health costs. Nor is it obvious that eliminating as many jobs as possible is desirable. Especially if smaller non-monoculture farms are ecologically better, and running such farms is an enjoyable lifestyle.

There is more and more organic plant breeding happening both by farmer- and gardener-plant breeders as well as some university breeders. OSSI has more than 400 Pledged varieties bred for organics. In fact, almost all OSSI varieties and OSSI-associated breeders, freelance as well as university breeders, are focused on breeding for organics. 

[William Schlegel]

Alas, Pat Hayes barley, Full Pint, is NOT OSSI-Pledged. I notice it is still so listed by Krista Rome/Resilient Seeds. (I've emailed her asking her to make the correction.) Unfortunately, Pat did not get OSU's permission to OSSI-Pledge the variety. He thought it would be okay, as nobody appeared interested in licensing it. However, someone turned up to license it, and OSU IP people did not honor Pat's Pledging of the variety. So OSSI annulled the Pledging of the variety, given that the person who Pledged it was not the owner. OSSI subsequently added signatures for institutional IP departments to make sure this doesn't happen again. So far, of more than 400 varieties, this is the only one whose OSSI-Pledging had to be annulled.

That's a shame because a modern recently released barley variety would be good germplasm for organic open source high yield breeding.

[Carol Deppe]

The problem with just taking conventionally bred varieties and selecting them under organic conditions is that they often don't have the genetic variability needed. It can work, especially with very variable heirloom or landrace material. But not necessarily.

I usually start from scratch and breed for performance under organic conditions right from the first cross or selection.

My variety Goldini Zucchini was very deliberately selected to be the fastest germinating and growing squash on the planet. I think it will also prove to be the highest yielding. I talk about breeding for these characteristics in the podcast on breeding the squash I listed in the OSSI VAriety section.

[William Schlegel]

The problem with just taking conventionally bred varieties and selecting them under organic conditions is that they often don't have the genetic variability needed. It can work, especially with very variable heirloom or landrace material. But not necessarily.

I usually start from scratch and breed for performance under organic conditions right from the first cross or selection.

My variety Goldini Zucchini was very deliberately selected to be the fastest germinating and growing squash on the planet. I think it will also prove to be the highest yielding. I talk about breeding for these characteristics in the podcast on breeding the squash I listed in the OSSI VAriety section.

I was thinking more of using a modern conventional parent crossed with or allowed to cross with an old heirloom in order to generate some variation before beginning selection. I see a lot of folks talking about within variety selection for highly inbred crops like tomatoes and while I think some selection is necessary to maintain the variety (from reading your books), that just doesn't seem like a very fruitful endeavour because there is only so much variation there- and much more variation can be had from a cross or crosses.

https://osseeds.org/seeds/

Checking the OSSI website there is one wheat listed, a soft white named Saranac. So let's say we wanted to generate some variation and we crossed Saranac with "Lofthouse" an heirloom wheat discovered by one of Joseph's ancestors. We could take those variable offspring and select them for available favorable traits under organic growing conditions. Then make some selections, relist those on OSSI, spread the seed and repeat?

How long is a particular variety under patent protection? In the 1990s the company Wheat Montana grew a lot of Golden 86 and Bronze Chief wheat- this was true in 1993 when we bought a vitamix blender. Are they open source now?

I have a bit of perhaps a bad habit of buying wheat from bulk bins to plant in my garden. I know little about it other than that it is hard white spring, hard red spring, hard red winter, or soft white. Would there be increasingly bad legal issues with using such seed for breeding? I learned in 2012 from Pat Hayes that some non gmo small grains have patented DNA from targeted mutation breeding programs for stupid traits like herbicide resistance. So basically even though all wheat is non-gmo there may still be some weird ways to patent stuff that really shouldn't be patented.