Reading Time: 4 minutes Plant breeding is strictly a numbers game — but researchers have found a way to improve the odds with help from a new tool called a ‘breeder chip.’ “Breeding is like a lottery. The more tickets you buy, the greater the chance of success,” said Curtis Pozniak, a professor of plant sciences and wheat breeder […] Read more
Wheat breeders get a cheat sheet
‘Breeder chip’ doesn’t make the process faster but ups the odds of hitting pay dirt
Cereal seed royalty gets thumbs down at consultations
Government is asking farmers what they think about seed royalties — and the answer is ‘not much’
Reading Time: 4 minutes The idea of charging royalties on cereal seed didn’t go over well with many Alberta farmers who attended a federal government consultation on proposed royalties. “The overarching thing is that control would be imposed and that would be my concern,” Trochu farmer Kevin Niemi said in an interview. “A royalty is like a seed tax […] Read more
Crop Commissions to fund wheat research
Reading Time: < 1 minute The Alberta Wheat Commission and its Saskatchewan counterpart will spend $1.6 million over three years on seven wheat research projects. These include stripe rust surveillance to improve resistance in regional wheat varieties, developing a reliable method of gene editing in wheat to simplify the breeding process, and improving nitrogen use efficiency. Other research will look […] Read more
The next frontier of plant breeding
Advocates say game-changing genome editing is completely different from genetic engineering — but will the public agree?
Reading Time: 6 minutes Farmers need to get in front of the messaging about genome editing technology — or risk seeing it suffer the same fate as GMOs in the court of public opinion. That’s the warning from the chair of Alberta Wheat’s research committee, who is one of many who fears genome editing is going to get lumped […] Read more
The rules are still being written for genome editing
Reading Time: < 1 minute Researchers are excited about genomic editing’s potential to develop new crop varieties without the controversial genetically modified label. However, the regulation of genome edited crop varieties is still up for debate. In March, the U.S. agriculture secretary said his officials won’t regulate plants that could otherwise have been developed through traditional breeding techniques. “With this […] Read more
Key source of clubroot resistance goes AWOL
‘Grandparent’ can defeat new mutated clubroot strains but somehow it doesn’t get passed down
Reading Time: 3 minutes The ‘grandparent’ of clubroot resistance in most Canadian canola varieties is resistant to new virulent strains of clubroot — but its offspring aren’t. “It’s possible that, in the course of breeding, some of the resistant genes were lost,” said provincial research scientist Rudolph Fredua-Agyeman. European clubroot differential (ECD) 04 is a key source of clubroot […] Read more
Encouraging seed diversity is essential for the future
We should mourn the loss of diversity in older crop varieties and the concentration of seed ownership
Reading Time: 3 minutes One of the wonders of travel and of food is the vast varieties of plants that beautify our world. Many have medicinal and nutritional qualities and have been used for food or healing for thousands of years. Others are new hybrids that beautify the plate and add colour to our meal. They all have ancient […] Read more
New tool could speed up crop breeding
Reading Time: < 1 minute Alberta’s barley breeders now have access to both phenomic (field trial) and genomic data in one place. “The phenomic data is in the hands of the breeder, but the genomic data is generated through lab work,” said provincial researcher and biostatistician Rong-Cai Yang, who developed a new software program called the Barley Breeding Platform (BBP). “Usually […] Read more
Double-resistant canola variety now available
But the first variety with ‘multigenic’ resistance is not a silver bullet, experts warn
Reading Time: 2 minutes A new hybrid canola cultivar that offers double resistance to clubroot has been registered and is now available to farmers. Proven Seed PV 580 GC was developed by University of Alberta canola breeder Habibur Rahman and Crop Production Services (CPS). It carries a resistance gene from Mendel, a European winter canola cultivar, and a second […] Read more
New Plant Breeders’ Rights database launched
Reading Time: < 1 minute A new database to assist seed sector stakeholders to easily identify Plant Breeders’ Rights (PBR) protection on crop varieties registered for sale in Canada has been launched. The Crop Varieties Registered in Canada and Plant Breeders’ Rights Status database was created by the Canadian Seed Trade Association with the assistance of the Canadian Food Inspection […] Read more
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