Vigor or rigor? The competing goals of variety trials

Abstract

Both growers and vegetable seed companies have had long-term historic relationships with public agriculture extension educators and faculty to conduct unbiased evaluation of vegetable varieties. Reductions in both the number of vegetable seed companies as well as university human resources has led to questions about the viability and appropriateness of publicly-funded variety evaluation programs. Field based extension educators and regional staff have taken more leadership to evaluate varieties, but this often results in fragmented or repetitive trials with limited long term integration of data. Statewide vegetable extension specialists must provide the leadership in coordinating these trials to enhance the rigor of data collection and analysis. Fundamental to enhancing rigor is improving regional coordination and collaboration. The calculation of stability estimates for new and older varieties is most efficiently and quickly achieved through regional collaborations. Initial efforts should improve uniformity of trials by creating common evaluation methods for yield and qualitative evaluations (e.g., color, appearance), including two standard varieties (one local and one regional, long-term standard), standardizing field establishment practices, and selecting experimental designs and plot sizes to improve labor efficiency. These regionally coordinated trials will improve the ability to publish this type of applied research and demonstrate new levels of efficiency for university administrations. In the long term, carefully designed comparisons of genotypic performance among different environments could suggest new directions for university breeding programs as well as cropping systems research.