Guarding Future Food Crops
An ancient apple, Malus sieversii has recently been cultivated by the United States Agricultural Research Service, in hopes of finding genetic information of value in the breeding of the modern apple plant. Some of the resulting trees show unusual disease resistance. The variation in their response to disease on an individual basis is, itself, a sign of how much more genetically diverse they are than their domesticated descendants.
Australia, too, needs to save the wild gene pools. If disease wipes out our modern fruit cultivars, those genes will be essential to the survival of future food crops.
Many roadside wildlings survive, without sprays or nurturing, simply because they are disease or pest resistant.
Renowned author and gardener Jackie French writes in a February 24 2013 Canberra Times article titled
‘The wild times of apple trees-
Without cultivation in the equation, roadside fruit is often the best to be found’:
‘Hands up: has anyone ever found an apple tree along the side of the road that failed to bear apples? Has anyone ever picked roadside apples and found they were full of fruit fly or codlin moth? As dedicated feral apple sampler, I can duly swear I have never come across a bad wild apple.’
Australia, too, needs to save the wild gene pools. If disease wipes out our modern fruit cultivars, those genes will be essential to the survival of future food crops.
Many roadside wildlings survive, without sprays or nurturing, simply because they are disease or pest resistant.
Renowned author and gardener Jackie French writes in a February 24 2013 Canberra Times article titled
‘The wild times of apple trees-
Without cultivation in the equation, roadside fruit is often the best to be found’:
‘Hands up: has anyone ever found an apple tree along the side of the road that failed to bear apples? Has anyone ever picked roadside apples and found they were full of fruit fly or codlin moth? As dedicated feral apple sampler, I can duly swear I have never come across a bad wild apple.’