Ithaca, New York
October 23, 2001
A
lush, tasty squash with cream-color skin and forest green
stripes, named Cornell's Bush Delicata, has been named a 2002
All-America
Selection (AAS), a seed industry award. It is the first
Cornell University developed variety to win the prestigious
award in 39 years.
The squash, bred by Molly Jahn, Cornell associate professor of
plant breeding, and George Moriarty, Cornell research plant
breeder, combines the best features of an heirloom-type
delicata. That squash is noted for excellent eating quality and
disease resistance, which reduces the need to apply fungicide
during the growing season. The delicata squash was popular in
the early part of the 20th century, but went out of style due to
poor yields and susceptibility to disease.
Cornell's Bush Delicata is not a hybrid, as are most modern crop
varieties, but an open-pollinated variety, which means the seed
can be saved. It has the sweet and nutty heirloom flavor with
uniform, deep yellow color and thick flesh, but better yield
than the delicata. "The organic growing community is going to be
very interested in this," says Moriarty.
The award is the highest honor that can be bestowed on a
vegetable variety in North America. The only other
Cornell-developed vegetable to win the award was buttercrunch
(bibb) lettuce in 1963, developed by the late George Raleigh,
Cornell professor of vegetable crops. "The award reflects that
Cornell's Bush Delicata was judged outstanding in an
international competition consisting of trials from Florida to
Alberta. This carries more weight than any other industry
judging activity," says Jahn. "This honor is sought by all the
companies and rarely goes to the public sector." The new squash
had humble beginnings in the vegetable aisle of a P&C grocery
store in Ithaca's East Hill Plaza. That is where Henry Munger,
now a Cornell professor emeritus, purchased a delicata-type
squash in the late 1980s. Over the years, Jahn and Moriarty used
the seed from
this single squash in a breeding program to transfer resistance
to powdery mildew, the most virulent fungal disease of squash in
many parts of the world. They crossed the plant with acorn
squash, hoping to get a disease-resistant acorn with improved
eating quality and a novel appearance. But the original cross
kept segregating back to its parents, delicata and acorn.
The breeders kept selecting and inbreeding plants to produce
delicata-shaped resistant to mildew and with compact stature,
good for both home gardeners and commercial producers. The
product
yielded a heavy load of winter squash with good color, quality,
and shape, says Moriarty. It also was used as a parent of
Harlequin, an acorn squash-type hybrid, also released by the
Cornell breeders that narrowly missed becoming an AAS award
winner last year. "If you have never eaten a delicata squash,
this is the one to grow to eat," according to the AAS web site.
"The orange flesh color indicates it is rich in vitamin A. The
sweet flesh is fine textured without coarse strings."
Cornell's Bush Delicata has a long shelf life -- about 100 days
-- and it will remain edible well into the winter months.
Harvest can begin about 80 days after sowing the seeds. In 67
years of AAS
winners, there have been 323 flowers, 255 vegetables and 17
bedding plants.
Contact: Blaine P. Friedlander
Jr.
Office: 607-255-3290
E-mail: bpf2@cornell.edu
Cornell University news release
N3904
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