Winter 2020
New stars on the market shelf
Festive Cosmic Crisp® apples are a hit for eating fresh or cooking. » More ...
Fruit Trees
Fall 2020
A taste of the wild side
Wild apples and their desirable traits might speed up the process of apple breeding. » More ...
Fall 2019
Moving an orchard
How do you move an iconic orchard? The century-old Tukey Horticultural Orchard at Washington State University had to find a new home, again. » More ...
Fall 2019
Rainier cherries
Sensitive and sweet, Rainier cherries developed at WSU are "tree candy." » More ...
Fall 2019
Gallery: Tukey Orchard through the years
The Tukey Orchard at Washington State University has provided fruit and research opportunities for a century.
Take a visual stroll among the orchard over the years.
Read more about the moving of Tukey Orchard.
Spring 2019
Stopping the blighters
Fire blight, a voracious bacterial infection, has plagued apple and pear trees for years, but weather conditions have worsened the severity of infestations in Washington state since 2015. That has spurred Washington State University researchers to seek resistant trees and Extension educators to help growers manage the disease. » More ...
Fall 2017
Plums
Of all the fruit trees, it sometimes seems like the most common backyard resident is the plum. Whether you live in Lynden or Lind, if you don’t have a nearby plum tree, chances are you can find one. A neighbor might even give you a big bag of purple fruit.
Although apples, pears, and cherries dominate the commercial tree fruit of Washington, the state produces the second-most plums in the nation. To be fair, California commands that sector, with 97 percent of the plum market.
That doesn’t diminish the plum as a tasty addition to any homegrown suite of fruit. In fact, Washington … » More …
Spring 2017
Faster drop for a new crop
Water and time are money if you’re a farmer. Trees are especially slow, and to get a new apple variety growing at a commercial scale can take years. It not only takes a couple of years after planting for fruit production to start, but it’s a long time just getting trees to plant.
The number of trees needed to plant a commercial-scale orchard is daunting. Even a small orchard of 100 acres needs nearly a quarter million trees to get going. And while it might take only a couple years to “raise a few rootstocks, thousands can take many years,” Washington State University apple breeder … » More …
Winter 2016
Saving citrus from a sour end
An invader is sweeping like fire through the citrus groves of Florida. The Candidatus Liberibacter asiaticus bacterium causes citrus greening, a disease that block trees’ nutrient and water channels and prevents fruit from ripening.
“It’s like choking the tree from the inside out,” says David Gang, a Washington State University molecular biologist and biochemist who is collaborating with a large, multi-institution, interdisciplinary team to combat the disease. If left unaddressed, the entire U.S. citrus industry could be wiped out and, as Florida Senator Bill Nelson said a few years ago, “We’ll end up paying $5 for an orange—and it’ll have to be one imported from … » More …
Fall 2016
Peaches
It’s just not a summer without them
Among the fruits of summer, one stands alone for its juicy sweetness, sunset colors, and soft fuzzy skin. There’s a reason we refer to good things as “peachy.” Washington’s fame may be apples, but peaches sit proudly next to them, as well as our pears and Rainier cherries at roadside stands and farmers markets.
The volume of other tree fruit grown in the state dwarfs peaches and their siblings, the fuzzless nectarines. According to the USDA, Washington produced 13,800 tons of peaches in 2015, compared to 3.15 million tons of apples and 340,000 tons of pears.
One reason … » More …