Variety Trialing

The process of variety development takes many years from the original cross to the point where a succesful new variety is brought to market.

The final stage in the process is replicated trials carried out on farms in ware producing areas to test varieties against existing controls and to assess their capability to produce crops which meet our customers specifications.

These trials are designed to withstand statistical scrutiny, involve three replicated plots and are key to our decision to proceed with a variety. If there is no yield advantage, or the crop is out of customer specification or some unacceptable trait emerges, we can't recommend it to our growers or customers.

In 2002 we recommenced our primary crossing programme as a starting point in the quest to develop improved crisping and prepack varieties. Using accelerated, in-house, progeny testing and by market testing with our customers at the earliest possible stage, we believe we can fast track the introduction of improved varieties for our customers and our growers.

The replicated variety trials are undertaken on sites in England and in France. We include our own, most promising breeding material, as well as carefully screened material from other European breeders with whom we have links.

We harvest our prepacking and processing sites each autumn and the produce is safely in store at Finningley.

The processing varieties are stored at three temperatures : 6, 8 and 10 degrees to decide on the most suitable storage regime. Each month throughout the season the samples are fried and rated for colour and blemish.