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Citrus General Discussion / Re: 9 Year Search Finally Reveals Psylid Sex Phermone
« on: February 21, 2018, 12:45:02 PM »
Great find!
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Looks like Policicchio groves has closed as well! http://www.juicycitrus.com/homepage.html.
We used to buy paper grocery store bags of citrus that didn't look good enough to ship
back in the 60/70s for $1 a bag when I was a high schooler at Merritt Island HS. I can still
taste the minneolas and temples we bought that were good beyond belief! We bought the oranges
from a little old lady, must have been the founders wife. Citrus groves surrounded the store on
North Merritt Island. She was still there in the 80/90s when I vacationed there.
The Policicchio Groves retail store on north Merritt Island will not reopen because of citrus grove damages wreaked by Hurricane Irma, an owner announced.
"This was a very difficult decision we had to make especially approaching our 100th year of my grandparents, Carmelo and Domenica Crisafulli planting the orange groves," Ruth Policicchio Kaplet, a third-generation owner, posted on the company website at juicycitrus.com.
"However, we are pleased to announce that we will continue our mail order shipments of Citrus Gift Packages. We will shortly have this website ready for you to order. Sorry for the delay. If you ordered from us last year, you will receive our new catalog soon," she wrote.
"On behalf of the Policicchio Groves family, it has been a truly rewarding experience serving our many loyal customers for the past 98 years. We will dearly miss each and everyone of you and wish you good health and happiness," she wrote.
Policicchio Groves officials could not be reached for comment this week. The retail store is located on North Courtenay Parkway.
Earlier this month, Harvey's Groves officials announced the permanent closure of the citrus company's seasonal retail stores in Rockledge and West Melbourne. Mail order business remains active at harveysgroves.com.
Of all the stones being thrown at HLB, the development of tolerant or resistant rootstocks and scions is among the rocks that could deliver a long-term solution to the disease. The disease itself has flipped the citrus breeding game as researchers widen the search for variety winners.
Peter Chaires, Executive Director of the New Varieties Development & Management Corp. (NVDMC), says a look at pre-HLB days compared to today provides historical context.
“On the processed side of the ledger, there had been very little interest in new oranges before HLB,” Chaires says. “Breeders were working on them to some degree, but most growers were perfectly happy with Hamlin, Mid-Sweet, Pineapple, and Valencia. Since HLB, the breeding programs have really put their foot on the gas to not only get the most promising processing-oriented scions released, but to continue to fill the pipeline with more material — all of which has superior traits. Field screenings for robust or enhanced performance in the face of HLB is a necessary part of this program.
“During this time, The two UF/IFAS OLL’s, plus ‘Valquarius’ and the ‘Vernia’ have been made available. More orange hybrids that show enhanced tolerance — and orange-like characteristics but that are not 100% sweet orange — are making their way into trial plantings. Breeding oranges is not like breeding mandarins. It’s a much slower process with fewer development options.
“On the fresh side, the number of developed and released selections has increased drastically. Whereas there used to be one release every 20 years or so, we have seen approximately 22 fresh selections made available through the accelerated programs and a number of private or proprietary selections come into Florida for trial.”
The Challenge
With so much material in the pipeline, it poses a challenge in the development and release process. There was a need to slow down development to learn more about the viability of what is already available.
“In recent years, fewer crosses were made and a greater emphasis has been placed on evaluation,” Chaires says. “Some evaluations are more formal designed experiments, including the collection of hard data, while others are observational.
“What we do know is that breeding cannot be turned on and off like a light switch. As new parents demonstrate promise and new techniques are developed, we must continue to feed the pipeline — though not at the pace we did a few years prior. Growers and nurseries need varieties with superior traits and with the ability to withstand HLB, preferably with minimal care.”
Jude Grosser, a Professor of plant cell genetics for UF/IFAS, who is seeking the best rootstock/scion combinations, says it is complicated because many of the rootstocks in established trials were developed to solve other problems before HLB came along.
“We need to balance this with looking for the ‘home run’ rootstock — which should come from new selections being screened right off the bat for ability to provide protection against HLB in a grafted scion,” Grosser says. “I believe we are looking for a needle(s) in a haystack. So, the bigger the haystack, the better the odds of finding something that will work.”
Grosser has tested thousands of rootstocks hybrids using his “gauntlet” approach. After screening for initial soil adaptation and Phytopthora viability, the more robust candidates are grafted with HLB-infected Valencia and grown off. This is a quick way to see if the rootstock can mitigate the disease.
“I have been doing this for six years, and I have a few hybrid rootstocks that look especially promising,” Grosser says. “Two of which we are producing seed adequate for large scale testing.”
Grosser adds another complicating factor is understanding how these new selections will react to various nutrition programs. Because not all trials have the same program, it can make it harder to make comparisons among trials at different locations.
Citrus, in many ways, stands alone. So many cultivated species have come from so few primary ancestors. Just three, in fact: citrons, pomelos, and mandarins, all native to South and East Asia before they started their journeys west, to places like Florida, California, and Brazil that built entire economies around fruits from the other side of the world.
Such simple lineage is the result of impressive commonality. Almost all citrus has the rare genetic combination of being sexually compatible and highly prone to mutation. Such traits allow their genes to mix, for thousands of years on their own, and eventually, at the hands of humans. The product of so much natural crossing in the wild and selective breeding at research farms and in fields is every orange, lemon, lime, and grapefruit you’ve ever eaten.
No other fruit genus can boast such pedigree, and new research is bringing clarity to the origin of citrus. Grapefruits are a human discovery, less than 300 years old. But citrus itself is ancient. Fossilized leaves discovered in China’s Yunnan Province in 2009 and 2011 suggest citrus has existed since the late Miocene epoch, as many as seven million years ago. Humans, however, have brought a great winnowing: Out of thousands of wild types, only a few dozen have become commercial behemoths like the navel orange, Eureka lemon, and Mexican lime. They’re the citrus one percent.
The scientists who study citrus love it for its appeal, its mystery, and its drama. “There’s something fascinating, freaky, even sexy about citrus,” says pomologist David Karp, whose research informs the above illustration. A bacterial disease called huanglongbing (a.k.a. citrus greening) that causes plants to defoliate, decay, and eventually die, is threatening commercial production on every arable continent, including North America, where the disease arrived in 2005.
Yet a fruit group of such illustrious history won't be exterminated so easily. The future is likely to bring more types of citrus, not fewer. “Citrus is competitive,” says citrus breeder and geneticist Fred Gmitter, explaining how global researchers race to develop, say, mandarin oranges that are sweeter, seedless, and easier to peel. “In the near future you’ll see a lot of outside-the-box new stuff.” And, an ever expanding family tree.
Daniel Stone is an editor for National Geographic magazine, where he covers science, technology, and agriculture. His book, The Food Explorer, on the life and adventures of food spy David Fairchild, will be published by Dutton (Penguin Random House) in 2018.
ROCKLEDGE, Fla. —
Central Florida is saying goodbye to one of the last major roadside citrus businesses in the area.
Roadside citrus stands were once a Central Florida trademark and tourist attraction, but now they can’t make enough money to stay afloat and Harvey’s Groves officials have decided to close the company’s Rockledge and West Melbourne locations.
The sepia-toned pages of an old photo album bring to life the sleepy, pastoral days of the mid-20th century. That’s when Harvey’s Groves was in its heyday, selling hand-squeezed orange juice to travelers for a nickel.
WESH-TV
“I don’t like it at all. I don’t like it. I planned to work till I was 80 years old, like my father,” said Jim Harvey.
Jim Harvey spoke with WESH 2 News Monday by phone about the family business that was started in 1926. The Rockledge store was once surrounded by citrus groves which were wiped out by the disease known as greening.
“Every grower in Florida has been devastated by greening, and us, too. We’ve probably lost 60 to 80 percent of our acreage to greening,” Harvey said.
Buying habits have changed, too. People don’t visit the classic old storefront anymore, where bright, juicy oranges were once piled up in mouth-watering abundance. Now, people buy online, and that’s the only part of the business that’s keeping Harvey’s alive at all.
At one time, the section of U.S. 1 near Rockledge where Harvey’s is located, was dotted with at least six citrus stands.
There is a very popular olive oil company in southern GA. One of their websites is below:
http://georgiaolivefarms.com/gof/products-services/
I think they grow mostly Arbequina.
I also saw some fruiting at the Savannah Bamboo Gardens...