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A new variety of hairy vetch called Purple Bounty
expands the use of vetch as a winter cover crop to the entire Northeast.
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Early-Flowering, Winter-Hardy Hairy Vetch Released for Northern United
States
By Don Comis
April 17, 2008
Agricultural Research Service (ARS)
geneticist and breeder
Thomas
Devine and collaborators have released "Purple Bounty," the first
winter-hardy, early-flowering vetch for the northern United States.
Until now, hairy vetch--a cover crop and weed-suppressing mulch favored
particularly by organic farmers--had limited use north of Maryland because it
copes poorly with northern winters. But Purple Bounty has survived winters as
far north as upstate New York.
Devine, with the ARS
Sustainable
Agricultural Systems Laboratory in Beltsville, Md., spent nine years
breeding this variety. He used traditional breeding methods so that the variety
would be acceptable to organic farmers. He started with several hairy vetch
types from Auburn University in Auburn, Ala., and from the U.S.
National Plant Germplasm System,
then maintained in Georgia. There he found early-flowering types.
From these, Devine selected for improved winter hardiness while maintaining
early flowering. He harvested seed from plants that survived winters at
Beltsville and at the University of Maryland farm at Keedysville in northern
Maryland. Purple Bounty emerged from nine cycles of selection, with the right
blend of winterhardiness and early flowering.
It flowers two weeks earlier than a commonly used variety. This allows
farmers to plant their main crop earlier in spring and use corn and tomato
varieties that require a longer growing season.
Limited quantities of seed should be available for planting in 2008, with
commercial quantities available in 2009.
Devine's collaborators on the release of Purple Bounty included the
Rodale Institute near Kutztown,
Penn.; the Cornell University Agricultural Experiment Station at Ithaca, N.Y.;
and the Pennsylvania Agricultural Experiment Station at University Park.
Read
more about the research in the April 2008 issue of Agricultural Research
magazine.
ARS is the U.S. Department of
Agriculture's chief scientific research agency.