Emmalea Ernest, Extension Fruit & Vegetable Specialist; emmalea@udel.edu
Many of our 2024 field research projects are completed but a few will still be in the field this winter. Over the next few months, I will be preparing trial reports and presentations for winter meetings. I look forward to sharing some interesting and useful results during the Fruit and Vegetable Growers Association of Delaware’s educational meetings during Ag Week. The Fruit Session will be on Monday, January 13, the General and Fresh Market sessions will be on January 14, and the Processing Session will be January 15.
In the meantime, I am sharing some photos from this past season’s trials. Thank you to the Carvel farm crew and the Veggie Team (seasonal employees Ketsia Murat, Lily Hearn, Arely Arriaga-Gonzalez, Brayden Hearn, Twyla Beachy and Sam Cooke, vegetable Extension agent Lyndsie Mikkelsen and technician Frank Reith.)
There were good yields in the processing pea trial this year.
We tested almost 500 faba bean varieties from around the world to see if any might work as a crop for overwintered or spring planted production in Delaware
We trialed 18 white supersweet fresh market sweet corn varieties at two planting dates.
So many snap beans! We trialed round and flat bush snap beans for yield and heat stress tolerance. We also tested 11 climbing snap bean varieties.
We identified some new heat tolerant lettuce varieties in trials transplanted in June and July. We also tested whether silver or white plastic mulch is best for summer lettuce production.
We are testing new UD breeding lines in baby, fordhook and pole lima trials. I am also freezing samples for sensory evaluations in the coming months.
Biofumigant mustard that we planted in September and October of 2023 overwintered and we are repeating the experiment this fall to see if we get similar results.
The 2024 Veggie Team: (back row, left to right) Frank Reith, Lily Hearn, Ketsia Murat, Lyndsie Mikkelsen, and Arely Arriaga-Gonzalez, (bottom row left to right) Twyla Beachy, Sam Cooke, Brayden Hearn, and Emmalea Ernest.