Farming, Saturday, August 18,1984
Hort
ROCK SPRINGS - Visitors to
Ag Progress Days can see Penn
State’s horticulture farm where
much the field research on tree
fruits, and on vegetables for
Pennsylvania is being conducted.
Rock Springs is located just nine
miles southwest of State College on
Route 45. Rock Springs provides a
living laboratory for teaching
purposes and for demonstrations
of new ideas and concepts. The
research will be on display as part
of Penn State’s Ag Progress Days
Tuesday through Thursday.
You can also see field research
on small fruits, ornamental hor
ticultural crops and greenhouse
construction. This research is
supplemented by field plots
located throughout the state on
grower farms and greenhouses,
and at stations at Biglerville
(mainly tree fruits). North East
(mainly grapes), and Landisville
(mainly field crops).
The horticulture farm at Rock
Springs was started about 25 years
ago, having moved from various
locations on the main campus.
Rock Springs comprises 1,500
acres, 160 acres of which can be
irrigated from two large water
reservoirs located on the side of
the mountain. Before becoming a
research farm, the area was in
general farming. Some of the
original farm buddings are still in
use. Other structures have been
added over time to improve the
research capabilities of this im
portant facility for Pennsylvania’s
agriculture.
Funds for its operation crane
from the state, federal govern
ment, various grower groups, and
from industry. Besides specific
grants for various research areas,
industry helps in supplying
materials such as pesticides,
herbicides, fertilizers and plant
growth regulators.
Horticulture research at Penn
State includes; breeding, variety
testing, and new crops; plant
physiology and growth regulators;
nutrition; post-harvest physiology,
or storage and handling;
mechanization; and general
culture and productivity. *
Crops include: greenhouse
floriculture crops; ornamental
crops and nursery plants;
greenhouse and field vegetables;
and fruit tree and small fruit
crops.
The work is being done by the
departments of agricultural
engineering, plant pathology,
entomology, and agronomy.
Tree Fruit
Tree fruit research at Rock
Springs is primarily with apples.
Under study by Dr. Loren Tukey,
professor of pomology, are various
intensive orchard systems to
maximize the productivity of a unit
of land. These include the Penn
State low trellis hedgerow, the
Dutch slender spindle, the hoop
skirt and the French AXE (the tail
support system). Trees are as
close three feet in the row with
rows 10 to 12 feet apart. Yields
average from 900 to 1200 boxes per
Charles Boyer
Plant Breeding
farm holds a wealth of research
acre, but have been as high as 2000
boxes at 12 years of age. Besides
demonstrating early high yields,
trees are of a form more easily
managed from a labor standpoint.
Producing dwarf plantings in
volves tree training, and the use of
tree-size controlling rootstock.
Various plant growth regulators
are used to aid in enhancing
flowering, fruit set and fruit
growth. Some plant growth
regulator plots are for long
duration studies; others are for
exploring and developing the use of
new regulators showing potential
in vegetative control and cropping.
Rode Springs is also one of 25
locations across the United States
and Canada for the National
Rootstock Trail for Apples. In
addition, rootstock research is
concentrating on dwarfing forms
from Russia, Poland, France,
Germany, England and the United
States. The fruit tree nursery
contains stoolbeds of these root
stocks for propagating trees of
various varieties. Many of the
trees are propagated on the farm.
Although M. 9 and M. 26 have
been the main apple rootstocks
used in the past, newer plantings
are being made with M. 27, a more
dwarfing rootstock.
In the plantings, there are over
50 different apple varieties and
variety sorts, while provide
knowledge on tree fruit produc
tivity, growth habit and fruit
quality. There are about 15 acres of
tree fruits of all ages. This
research is under the leadership of
Dr. Loren Tukey.
Vegetables
Vegetable research is an im
portant activity on the horticulture
farm.
Dr. Ernest Bergman, professor
of plant nutrition, is involved in the
Penn State/South China
Agricultural College program. He
has brought back several varieties
of vegetable crops that appear to
Paul Grun
Potato Research
have a potential in Pennsylvania.
One vegetable with good potential
is Chinese Cabbage. Besides a trial
with varieties from all over the
world, is a nutritional study
related to potassium and
magnesium.
A graduate student of Dr.
Bergman is conducting a pepper
nutritional trial of 7 varieties with
3 levels of potassium and
magnesium. Of special interest is
their suitability in Pennsylvania as
to earliness, fruit thickness,
flowering, yield and nutrient
content.
David Beattie
Ornamentals
Potatoes
Rock Springs is one of 10 potato
demonstration research locations
in the state where different
varieties and lines are being
tested. Some of the newer varieties *
you might be interested include:
Penn 71, Buckskin, Pa 1, Yankee
Clipper, Rosa, and Islander. Also
included in this test by Dr. Richard
Cole, professor of agronomy, are
88 lines from Penn State Research.
There are also 3Z regional selec
tions for potato chipping
tablestock use, and 13 in the russet
long type variety trials throughout
Pennsylvania in 1965.
You can see potato clones from
the research of Dr. Paul Grim,
professor cytology and
cytogenetics (cell research) and
his graduate student. There are
primarily crosses of either Nor
chip or Katahdin by several South
American species, and back
crosses to present Ninth American
varieties. This research is being
done to develop improved potato
varieties.
The horticultural facilities at
Rock Springs serve as the farm
office, laboratories, greenhouse,
potting room, mechanics shop, and
equipment storage.
Near the horticultural farm is an
herb garden open to the public.
Lauren D. Tukey
Fruit Research
Greenhouses
Energy conservation in
greenhouse production of flowers
and vegetables is of great im
portance to the industry in Penn
sylvania and there are several
experimental greenhouses at Rock
Springs. These have been equipped
with solar heating units. However,
under Pennsylvania conditions
solar collectors have not been very
effective because of cloudy con
ditions.
The most effective means of
energy conservation has been the
use of thermal blankets to create a
false ceiling within the greenhouse
retarding the out-flow of energy,
and the use of double layer of glass
or plastic as covering for the
greenhouse. In addition, research
is under way on varieties which
tolerate lower temperatures, and
Larry Kuhns
Ornamentals
on production systems in these
greenhouses that enable
satisfactory plant growth and
production at lower energy levels.
Ornamentals
Research is being done on
container grown ornamental
plants by Dr. David E. Beattie,
professor of ornamental hor
ticulture, and Dr. Larry J. Kuhns,
associate professor of ornamental
horticulture Extension. A pipe
frame structure also serves for
teaching various methods in or
namental crop production.
There is a small ornamental
nursery as well as a small
crabapple and American holly
plantings for studying winter
hardiness, diseases, and plant
characteristics.
Weed Control
It is possible to obtain total weed
control in nurseries and Christmas
tree plantations. Since bare soils
create erosion problems, studies
are under way by Dr. Kuhns to
explore the use of various
perennial cover crops that are
easily managed and do not create
pest and rodent problems. The
ideal cover crop must establish
quickly, grow slowly with little
required mowing, and withstand
heavy equipment during or shortly
after a rain.
Plant Breeding
Dr. Charles Boyer, associate
Ernest Bergman
Vegetables
professor of plant breeding
genetics, is studying the
inheritance of fruit color in but
ternut squash, and is selecting for
high yielding and high quality
processing types. In other
breeding work, he is continuing to
develop extra sweet varieties of
sweet com with improved growth
characteristics.
Co-Cropping
Under evaluation at Rock
Springs is co-cropping or in
tercropping of sweet com and
carrots. Co-cropping has im
portance in small farm situations
and in third world countries where
suitable vegetable land is limited.
There is a vegetable experiment
to determine whether fall
fumigation of the soil has any weed
control potential. Dr. Peter
Ferretti, associate professor of
horticulture extension, is also
investigating tunneling on peppers
and melons as a method of
enhancing early crop development
in with plastic mulch.
Processing types of various
summer and winter squashes are
being evaluated for mechanical
harvesting suitability. Fresh
market types are being evaluated ‘
for early maturing and deep color.
These are variety trials of broc
coli, cauliflower, cabbage, pep
pers, pole beans, and processing
tomatoes.
There are research plots of Dr.
Orzolek, associate professor of
Extension horticulture, studying
the use of various gels as a soil
anti-crushing agent for direct
seeded tomatoes, fluid drilling
research where growth regulators
and fertilizers have been added to
the gel-seed mixtures of tomatoes
and peppers.
Other research is exploring the
potential for the use of soil and
foliar applied plant growth
inhibitors on processing tomatoes.
Several horticulturists and
graduate students are involved in
the innovative research being
coordinated by Dr. Orzolek.
Plant Nutrition
There are the research plots of
Dr. Cyril Smith, professor of plant
nutrition. Penn State is a leader in
vegetable nutrition. Smith’s
studies include:
the most effective source of
phosphorus and its more efficient
placement for tomatoes and sweet
com.
tests on soils with a high lime
requirement, the best rate over
time (4.5 T/acre vs., 1.5T/acre
yearly over 3 years),
the effect of three different
lime types on growth and yield of
tomatoes, lima beans, squash, and
cabbage, under different fertilizer
treatments.
studies on certain vegetable
crops which have been shown to
have different degrees of sen
sitivity to acid rain (tomato,
snapbean and beet). Research is
comparing the effect on limed and
non-limed soils, under six different
fertilizer treatments. Dr. Smith is
seeking to find out why some crops
are more productive than others
when grown on unlimed soils.