The National Plant Germplasm System
The plants in the National Plant Germplasm System are shared
with researchers, plant breeders and growers in hundreds of countries. New crop
varieties and landscape plants developed from this system's germplasm
collection have literally changed the face of agriculture and gardening in the
U.S. and elsewhere.
Some Milestones in plant
exploration...
- Naval oranges,
collected in Brazil, along with avocados brought back from Mesico in 1898,
created new California industries from these crops.
- Rice varieties,
collected in Japan in 1900, established the beginnings of rice growing in
Louisiana and Texas. Today, both are among North America's major rice-growing
states.
- Rootstock, on which
many U.S. peaches are now grown originally came from germplasm collected in the
1920's.
- A wild peanut,
discovered in Peru in 1966, provided some of today's varieties with genes for
resistance to two major diseases of peanuts.
- A wild oat, found in
Israel in the 1960's provided plant breeders with genes for developing one of
the world's most disease-resistant oat varieties.
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