To learn more about the unique benefits of renovating with our unique varieties, visit our Why Renovation? page.
- Why FLVI Plant Material Matters
- Return on Investment
- Why Purity is Critical
- New, Certified Conventional Propagators
Why FLVI Plant Material Matters
Why use Foundation level plant material?
-Renovating a bed is a major undertaking, shouldn’t the purest and best vines available be used?
-The cost of foundation level vines is about the same as the current cost of non-foundation vines produced from prunings.
-Sacrificing your own crop to produce large volumes of vine for a new planting may not be economical because of the high productivity of the new varieties.
-The cost to scrutinize mowings or prunings to a similar extent (i.e. DNA & virus testing) would probably exceed $500,000 per ton! You may not like what you find.
The devil is in the volunteers …
-Every cranberry bed inevitably gets volunteer seedlings.
-Many of these seedlings produce few fruit and instead put their resources into vegetative growth.
-If the bed is pruned for propagation, these vegetative volunteers contribute disproportionately and have the potential to severely contaminate a new bed.
-This can be especially significant when the prunings are used for rooted cuttings or low-density plantings.
Return on Investment
Return on investment from renovation should be accelerated with Rutgers new varieties due to:
-More rapid establishment and vigorous stolon growth.
-Increased cash flow from higher yields.
This chart shows that the accumulative cash flow from a bed renovated with Crimson Queen® exceeds that of a non-renovated bed by Year 4, more than making up for the cost of renovation.
(This chart does not include Planting Incentive and uses: $12,000/renovation cost, $40/barrel price, and Crimson Queen® earnings estimated from yield of 100 sq. ft. research plot in Chatsworth, NJ, Years 6 – 12 yield projected from mean of Years 4 – 5.)
To learn more regarding how renovation will impact your own farm, please Click Here
to view a Cost-Benefit Analysis calculator.
Why Purity is Critical
The following image is an example of a fingerprinting gel with 12 samples:
Average bed productivity was 31 – 396 bbls/acre
Lane 1 is the Stevens control fingerprint.
Lanes 2 – 6 represent five samples from a Stevens bed that is relatively pure.
Lanes 7 – 12 represent samples from a second bed exhibiting a high level of contamination.
The blue line in this graph represents a two year average yield in each of the 17 beds. The red bars represent the number of off-types in each of the 17 beds. Beds with a greater number of “non-Stevens” bands generally were lower yielding.
New, Certified Conventional Propagators
Certified Conventional Propagators are licensed to propagate the newest Rutgers Varieties. Their beds are established and maintained in accordance with “Best Management Practices”, to minimize the chances of volunteer seed contamination.
These beds are established with FLVI plant material.
Beaton’s, Inc.
Matt Beaton
Vern Gebhardt Cranberry Marsh, Inc.
Randy Gebhardt
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Bob Donaldson
Bob Donaldson
