New Wheat Breeder at OSU
- Sterling Allen
- Jun 20
- 3 min read
Agritimes recently had the opportunity to visit Dr. Margaret Krause in her office at the OSU Crop Science building, Corvallis, OR. Dr. Krause began her tenure as an assistant professor and Warren Kronstad Wheat Re- search Chair in November 2023, replacing retiring Dr. Robert Zemetra, OSU wheat breeder.
Not having an agricultural background but rather coming from the suburbs of Minneapolis-St. Paul the idea of becoming a wheat breader did not occur to Krause until working in a lab her freshman year at the University of Minnesota. While attending UM she learned about famous alumni, Norman Borlaug's con tributions to crop improvement in the 1950's and 1960's. Borlaug was known as the Father of the Green Revolution and was awarded a Nobel prize in 1970. Krause later pursued her Ph. D, at Cornell University in plant breeding. She served as a fellow at Intentional Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMY)in Mexico where she worked in the Bread Wheat Program. Prior to coming to OSU, she was an assistant professor at Utah State in the small grains program. “My goal the past year was to travel the state of Oregon visiting with growers and at tending field days. I am always trying to ask wheat growers what they want from the OSU wheat program. Willamette Valley farmers asked for a new wheat variety to grow in wet soils,” said Krause. Valley farm ers are still growing Yamhill, a variety released in 1970. Krause teaches classes during winter term and is always looking to recruit 12 under graduate students to help conduct trials. She has two staff, based at Hyslop Field Lab, that are currently on assignment to spray trial fields, Clearfield and Co-Axiom plots, in Pendleton.
A wheat breeder has labor intensive methods of determining a promising variety to release. A wheat plant is a self fertilizing plant. By emasculation, breeders can eliminate pollen sources. During the winter, staff laboriously work on crossing 1000 wheat plants, one plant at a time. They cut open the f lorets (that will become seeds), and remove anthers that produce pollen. Pollen from another plant will be used to pollinate the wheat flower plant. Staff will observe 1,000 individual plant rows and pick the best plants for future trials. At the Rugg Farm Trials, Ad ams, OR, they have 40,000 individual 1 meter row trials. These trials have to be hand harvested, and the promising grain varieties selected for more trials. Krause is excited about a wheat variety OR2180149, that was #1 in intermediate rainfall trials, #3 in low rainfall trials and #6 in irrigated trials . The variety is resistant to soil born wheat diseases and rated most desirable in end use trials. OSU is expecting increased seed production of this variety this year. Part of the logistics of getting grain seed released to the public is getting commitments from seed companies to increase seed supply. Their goal is to convey earlier OSU grain variety releases and seed production in the future. Krause is also overseeing the OSU barley breeding program after the retirement of Dr. Patrick Hays whose research team focused on the many uses of barley. Top Shelf, a new 2 row winter barley has good production and quality metrics scores. Winter barley varieties will yield better than spring variet ies. Top Shelf has been grown primarily in Southern Idaho. It is a dual purpose variety for malting and grain distilling. A marketing plus is that Top Shelf is the only winter barley released that doesn't contain carcinogen precursors which is important to the distilling industry. Krause recently returned from a trip with a Wheat Quality Improvement team consisting of Limagrain and Sygenta wheat breeders along with US Wheat staff which stopped in Bangkok, Thailand; Soul, Korea; and Tokyo, Japan. It was a great opportunity for Krause to collaborate and build relationships with notable wheat breeders. The goal of the team was to educate customers about merits of high qual ity wheat from the PNW. Breeders demonstrated and showcased their breeding programs and shared knowledge and information about end use quality traits. “We received no complaints about Soft White Wheat among end users,” said Krause. Krause has had big shoes to fill at OSU as pre vious breeders Dr.Warren Kronstad and Dr. Jim Peterson made significant contributions to the wheat industry in the PNW. Her ability to communicate and ask questions of growers will serve her well.
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