Ep. 02 — Story of ARoma 17 Rice and Talking Fruit Breeding with John Clark

In this episode, Science Writer John Lovett shares the story of how ARoma 17, an aromatic rice variety developed by the Arkansas Agricultural Experiment Station, came to be used as the base for an award-winning gin. And Nick Kordsmeier, director of AAES communications, sat down with John Clark, distinguished professor of horticulture and fruit breeding for the experiment station, to talk about the Arkansas  Fruit Breeding Program and how fruit breeding works.

Chapters

• 0:00 Introduction
• 1:11 The Story of ARoma 17 Rice
• 5:58 Talking Fruit Breeding with John Clark
• 26:45 Wrap-up

Transcript

[0:00] Introduction: Welcome to the Arkansas Food Farms and Forests podcast, the podcast bringing you the latest on food, fiber and forestry research from the Arkansas Agricultural Experiment station. The research arm of the University of Arkansas System Division of Agriculture.

[0:16] Nick Kordsmeier: Hello and welcome to the Arkansas Food, Farms and Forests podcast. My name is Nick Kordsmeier, and I’m the director of communications for the Arkansas Agricultural Experiment Station, the research arm of the University of Arkansas System Division of Agriculture.

Thanks for joining us here at the end of the year for our December 2021 episode. In this episode, we’re talking about plant breeding. The Arkansas Agricultural Experiment Station is home to a number of successful plant breeding programs, from row crops to small fruit — we’ll talk about two programs in this episode.

First up, Science Writer John Lovett will share the story of how ARoma 17 — an aromatic rice variety — was developed and caught the attention of a gin maker in Mississippi. After that, I sat down with John Clark, Distinguished Professor of Horticulture and world-renowned fruit breeder with the experiment station, to talk about our fruit breeding program and how fruit breeding works.

Without further ado, here’s John with the story of ARoma 17.

[Short musical interlude between segments]

[1:11] John Lovett: Rice breeders with the Arkansas Agricultural Experiment Station, based at the Rice Research and Extension Center in Stuttgart, didn’t intend for their second line of aromatic rice to become attractive to distillers and brewers, but that has been the case for ARoma 17, a fragrant, jasmine-type rice they adapted to grow in the rice fields of Arkansas.

Deborah Ahrent Wisdom, the assistant rice breeder at the Rice Research and Extension Center, said ARoma 17 is gaining in popularity.

Deborah Ahrent Wisdom: It's growing, it's finding — it's finding a market somewhere. It's not that I'm getting more calls, it’s that the people who are growing it are finding markets so they want more seed to grow next year.

 Lovett: While ARoma 17 may be a great addition to any meal, Wonderbird Spirits just outside of Oxford, Mississippi has taken it to new heights as the base for an award-winning gin. They are among a growing body of craft brewers and distillers using jasmine-type rice.

Although Wonderbird brought home two gold medals in 2020 at the San Francisco World Spirits Competition, their notoriety shot up when Garden & Gun Magazine named them a winner in the 2021 Made in the South Awards.

 The variety of rice at the center of it all holds a special place in the heart of Wisdom. 

 Wisdom: The cross was made in 2009 with Jazzman, which originated from LSU AgCenter. Interestingly enough, the parents of Jazzman, one of them is a variety called Ahrent that Dr. Moldenhauer developed and released in 2001 and that was named after my mother, Martha Ahrent.

 She was the first female to be appointed to the Rice Research and Promotion Board and the first female to chair the Rice Research and Promotion Board. And then she passed away during her her chairmanship. And so Dr. Moldenhauer honored her by naming her next rice release after my mom.

 Lovett: Wisdom helped create ARoma-17 with Karen Moldenhauer, who after 38 years, recently retired as professor of rice breeding for the Experiment Station.

After several years of field trials, the new rice was approved for release in 2018. But since the official paperwork was done in 2017, that’s where the rice gets its official name. 

 Wisdom wears two hats at the Rice Research and Extension Center. As the foundation seed manager, she also helps keep track of those who are using various rice cultivars released by the Experiment Station.

 She reaches out to farmers when a new line comes up for grabs, and one of those farmers was Mike Wagner, the father of Lawrence and Abbey Wagner of Two Brooks Farm. The brother-sister team started growing ARoma 17, labeled as Blue Jasmoon White Mississippi Jasmine Rice, in 2018, the first year of its release.

 Around the same time Two Brooks began growing ARoma 17, Chand Harlow and his fellow founders of Wonderbird Spirits -- Rob Forster and Thomas Alexander -- were looking for a Mississippi-grown foundation for their new gin. 

 After trying other base ingredients like corn and sweet potatoes to make their gin base, Wonderbird owners called up the Wagners of Two Brooks Farm and eventually settled on the aromatic rice known to breeders as ARoma 17.

 Chand Harlow: We contacted Two Brooks Farm in Sumner, Mississippi, and they grew a variety of mostly culinary rice. So they had things like basmati, jasmine, black rice, a red rice, long grain rice and maybe a wild rice variety, as well as a few different varieties. And so they brought us several 50 pound sacks of all the varieties, and we started experimenting.

 Lovett: They went through a lot of trial and error but settled on this special rice.

 Harlow: And really just fell in love with the distillate that came from the jasmine rice, which was the Blue Jasmoon, which I believe it was ARoma 17.

 Lovett: Even if you’re not interested in gin, Wisdom says that ARoma 17 by itself is a family-pleaser.

 Wisdom: I married into a family of three kids, and the funny story is, you know, when I first came, they only ate mashed potatoes or some sort of potato.

And one day we slipped a little ARoma 17 in. And ever since then, they want to eat Debbie's rice. So we eat ARoma 17, at least twice a week.

Lovett: ARoma 17 foundation seed is available through the Division of Agriculture’s foundation seed program at the Rice Research and Extension Center in Stuttgart. Visit our website to learn more.

[Short musical interlude between segments]

[5:58] Kordsmeier: You may not know it, but Arkansas is home to a highly productive small fruit breeding program. Since its inception in 1964, it’s released dozens of public varieties, including strawberries, blackberries, grapes, blueberries, peaches and nectarines. For the last 25 years, Dr. John Clark, Distinguished Professor of horticulture and fruit breeding for the Arkansas Agricultural Experiment Station, has been at the head of these fruit breeding efforts. Dr. Clark, who will be retiring at the end of 2022, is with us today to talk about the Arkansas Fruit Breeding Program. Thanks for being here, Dr. Clark.

So today I want to talk about the Arkansas fruit breeding program. You know, I think it's probably fair to say that a lot of people don't know that Arkansas has this thriving fruit breeding program. So I wanted to start off just by asking if you could tell us a little bit about the history of the Arkansas fruit breeding program and how we came to be so successful.

Dr. Clark: Well, the fruit breeding program started in 1964. Dr. James Moore began the program. Dr. Moore is a native of Plumerville. He got a Ph.D. at Rutgers University in New Jersey and worked for the USDA a few years. But he wanted to come home and make an impact in Arkansas with improved fruit.

He had seen the vision and the impact a fruit breeding program could be in a state or in a region. So he came back and started it, and the program started with a breadth of crops. It's somewhat unusual to have a number of crops. Many plant breeders focus on one crop, and that's all for their career. But he chose to work on strawberries, grapes, including wine juice and table, blackberries was a big one, peaches, nectarines and blueberries were added, some work in apples, and cooperated with others, so a lot of breadth in the program. 

I came to the University of Arkansas to begin work in July of 1980 and was a program technician with Dr. Moore. Got a Ph.D. here, and I spent eleven years as a resident director of our Fruit Research Station in Clarksville, where this whole program is based and has been all along, and then took Dr. Moore's place after he retired at the end of 1996. So our program is going on, is approaching 60 years now, and it's produced dozens of varieties of fruit. Some been very important, some haven't caught on. And that's just the nature of plant breeding.

And then one of the most exciting things now is not what we've done, but what the future holds. Dr. Margaret Worthington joined our fruit breeding effort in August of 2016, and so she's been here over five years now. We've worked together, she's assumed the majority of the work in the program. And so the program is set to have a continuation. So the idea is to be able to continue this great effort. And of course, the key thing is to produce varieties for Arkansas growers, but they do have some uses and in the region, the country in places in the world. 

Kordsmeier: Yeah, I've heard you say that our blackberry varieties are grown in every continent except for Antarctica. Is that true? 

Dr. Clark: Yes, that's true. They're grown, scattered around the world. Blackberries have really increased in production in the world in the last 30 years. And so we have licensed varieties that are developed here in various places in the world. And of course, the majority of the berries are grown in the United States, but it's fun to have a crop that's expanding in use. Blackberries are good, they're getting better all the time. And part of that's the effort here.

 Healthy, that's a good crop to see grow. And we have new technologies with blackberry production that are really, really enhanced the crop around the world.

Kordsmeier: So fruit breeding, I think, is a is a really interesting process because of how long it takes. And, you know, that takes years of effort and and talent to develop these varieties. And could you tell us a little bit about, you know, what the fruit breeding process looks like from start to finish? Where do you start? How do you what are you looking for whenever you're making selections? How do you make the crosses? And ultimately, how do you decide that a variety is worthy of release? 

Dr. Clark: Well, it is a long process, and it takes anywhere from nine to 15 years from the time a cross is made before a product of development because it takes time. These are perennial plants, takes a while for them to fruit, and you like to be sure when you release a variety, you're quite confident it's going to perform like you think and be successful for growers. The start of any breeding program, including fruits, is you have to have parents which have the traits that you want to combine. So that's called germplasm. That's just a word for the breeding parents you have. 

So when Dr. Moore started or when I assumed his place or Dr. Worthington also, we all evaluate the plants we have to breed with. And so we're looking at a whole range of traits? If you take something like blackberries, thornlessness is important. Well, we've got a lot of thornless parents now. Flavor is really important, but you want the berries to be firm. You would like to have good size on them. You'd like good yield. You know, you want healthy plants, the ability to get through hot summers and cold winters. And so you take parent plants and they don't necessarily have names, their numbered usually have things developed in the program.

If you combine traits over the years and you cross, those parents know so that you get complementary traits combined — where you would get something like maybe large size and great flavor, and you get something that tastes good and that's large — would be a simple example.

And then that cross would be — and this is classical breeding, pollen transfer on emasculated flowers, it's not genetically modified organisms or anything of that nature. So when you cross these two parents, you get seedlings or children or progeny from that, and you see that in a year or two or three, depending on the crop that you're working with. And then you go out and look at the children and find the ones that seem to have the traits that you had in mind with the combined characters of the parents. That's where the so-called art in here becomes important.

The science part is fundamentally genetics, trait inheritance, chromosome activity and things like that. The art is it more of a little bit of spotting that trait or that combination of traits or a combination of kind of the knowledge of the nuances of how traits work. Knowing what someone might use that plant for, sometimes that's very clear cut. Sometimes it's a little more obscure. I've found plants such as our very low stature dwarf blackberries. The first time I saw one, I didn't know what to think of it.

I kept it. And now we have a whole development effort and unique architecture plants which occurred from that one plant I found in 2002. So we select the plants. We test these so-called selections, that's the seedlings that are kept, and we put out or put them in trials and where we think are appropriate to see, do they really reliably crop? And then a key part of this is how do they compare to the varieties you already grow. If you have something new that's really not different or better than an established variety, well, that could be a reason not to release it. 

Then, the breadth of testing can be important. There might be somewhere in the world that it works, but not so great in Arkansas, and I've seen that before. And then finally, after it's well tested, then it's released in a release decision and normally made by the breeder, and it's approved by the Experiment Station Plant Materials Release Committee.

And our fruit varieties are normally patented and then nurseries are licensed to propagate and then their royalties paid back on plant sales as a routine and how that works. So it takes quite a long time. It can be long and drawn out.

You go from thousands to dozens to one or two and from seedlings selections down to a variety, so most of its trash, so plant breeders are big trash makers because they throw most things away that are produced because of the variation that just happens in progeny.

So that's a little how it works. And you might say, well, that is a long and drawn out that takes too long. Well, that's just the nature of it. But you always have thousands of these plants to look at, so that's pretty occupying.

For instance, right now, this is in for the summer of 2022. We have about 25-30,000 blackberry seedlings, and that's about eight or nine miles of plants. And so Dr. Worthington and I will spend time walking those rows, try to walk them every week or ten days during the fruiting season in June and July to find those good ones.

I've always held a pretty strong feeling I need to keep in shape because it's hot and eight or ten miles of walking eating blackberries and you get tired of 'em pretty quick because it's a little bit of a challenge. But that's part of breeding. Usually breeders are very committed to that and you kind of get into that rhythm of doing it. But that's the process.

Kordsmeier: So you could say you've tried quite a few blackberries in your lifetime.

 Dr. Clark: Yeah. I assume tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands or millions, I'm not not sure. You know, people say, 'you must really like blackberries.' I do like blackberries, but you know, about 30 minutes of eating blackberries, and I've kind of got my fill.

And so – but 30 minutes into maybe 40 hours of evaluation during fruit season, that's about 30 minutes of like, 'this is fun.' And then the rest of the hours would be based a little bit on resilience because a lot of tasting, you know. Blackberries are not the easiest crop of all the fruits to taste. 

Things like peaches and grapes are a lot easier. Blueberries are much easier than blackberries, but finding a good blackberry is really a joy. So it can be done. But yeah, you know, a lot of them.

Kordsmeier: And that goes back to that art question of it's, it's in the art of tasting these and identifying those characteristics that you want to continue on down the line. Right?

Dr. Clark: Yes, the art, there's art in all aspects of this. A tasting is a unique one. We taste differently. For instance, Dr. Moore, my predecessor, he preferred tart fruit more than me, and I'm more geared towards sweet and I could just tell the difference when we would work together. And that's just a personal preference. And then we have a huge variation in our public of what they perceive that they like. And and so and I've taught over the years, I teach that that's an opportunity that's not a limitation.

That means you've got a lot of options for customers. If you can get that product to them because a good tasting fruit, it's kind of hard to beat, particularly with health properties and all that, that really, really is good for us as a society in the country and world.

Kordsmeier: Absolutely. Well, that brings us to some specific varieties and two that I want to talk about today are two of your most recent blackberry — blackberry releases. That's Prime-Ark® Horizon and Sweet-Ark® Ponca. So starting off, can you tell us a little bit about what makes Prime-Ark® Horizon worthy of release? You know, kind of a special, unique berry?

Dr. Clark: Prime-Ark® Horizon is a primocane fruiting blackberry. Just briefly talk a little bit about what that is. So a blackberry is a perennial plant. They're really unique in that they have biennial canes.

That means the canes, the part that grows up from the ground or the crown, live two years. And so the first year canes are called primocanes, and most blackberries anyone has seen they just grow and then through a dor--after a dormant period, the next year, they fruit, flower and then they die.

OK, so the first year of primocane is the second year that same cane after dormancy or the winter it's called a floricane. So most of the varieties that anyone has ever seen in most of our Arkansas varieties are floricane fruiting, they fruit on canes that grew the year before.

Prime-Ark® Horizon is unique in it has primocane fruiting. That means it fruits on a cane that came up this year. So that's a discovery, and the first products in the world of that type of plant were made by the University of Arkansas.

And so primocane fruiting allows basically a second crop later in the summer or maybe into the fall, depending on how the weather goes. Gives a diversity of yield. Obviously, more marketing seasons, entirely different. The plants can be managed differently.

Some people in the world just make only the late summer and fall crop and then they mow the canes down. So they eliminate pruning so different things can be done. So Prime-Ark® Horizon is what I consider to be a complement a 2009 variety called Prime-Ark® 45. Prime-Ark® 45 has been important in the country, in the world as a promising fruit or particularly for fall fruiting and Prime-Ark® Horizon is quite similar.

It's an offspring of Prime-Ark® 45 and it complements 45 and it's a larger berry. It's firm, it's very productive and often when we have a crop, we don't really like to grow one variety only of something, so I would say it's a compliment. I feel like growers can use both of these and find which one works better in their production area. 

The disadvantage to Prime-Ark® Horizon and primocane fruiting in Arkansas and in areas like Arkansas where it's really hot in the summer, is this trait does not work as well when it gets above 90 for a number of days and on up to 100, that can hinder production.

But anyway, from Prime-Ark® Horizon has shown pretty good adaptation here. I've picked fruit on in to October from it at our research station in Clarksville. So that's its attributes. It does have a few thorns, but we feel like that would have a place, particularly for commercial production, not so much home garden as commercial production.

Kordsmeier: So whenever you say it extends into October or can. How's that different from floricanes?

Dr. Clark: Well, floricane fruiting here usually finishes up in early to mid-July.

Kordsmeier: OK, so that really extends.

Dr. Clark: Yeah, it's almost like another crop completely to have that sort of thing.

And our first selections that we made of primocane fruiting was in September of 1997. That's one of the first ones in the world were made. And so this is continued on since that time to improve these traits.

Kordsmeier: Great. Well, so before Prime-Ark® Horizon, your most recent blackberry variety release was Ponca, and I've heard you describe that as being one of the most exciting berries you've ever seen and had taken a part on. Can you tell us why it's so special?

Dr. Clark: Well, Ponca has been kind of my favorite ever since I've found it as a selection in a seedling field, and I kind of quickly wanted to multiply it and put it aside, like, is this thing really this good? And so one of the first things I noticed about it, very personal was that like, this is really good.

I'm going to pick all these and take them home. So I just had a few plants. But this is, this seems really good. It was really good about it. Two main things really stuck out. First off, it was very sweet. I like sweet fruits, and I think that's what most the public likes of blackberries. Most of the public just thinks blackberries are tart fruit, and that's just not true all the time, and it's getting less so.

And then the second thing about it that I noticed was it, oh, it was just a nice plant. It has a different type of growth habit. Sweet, and I thought, 'boy, boy, this is it.' I think now, of course, everything has some drawbacks to it, but that fine fruit and one thing about Ponca that it's hard to get in blackberries is good, consistent, berries, berry to berry to berry flavor. You get five blackberries in your hand, and they taste five different ways, depending on maturity. I'm not saying that Ponca is always perfect, but that uniformity was important. So a release Ponca, and I, of course, share samples with people.

What do you think of this? And it's always the one, boy, that's the best one there is. And so far, even though it's just gotten some commercial production, that's what people are telling me. But I guess the main thing is it's still the one I like, and it's the one after I work in blackberries four or five days during the summer on Friday, I usually go pick some just for the joy of having them. 

Kordsmeier: And I'll say I've sampled Ponca and I agree they're pretty fantastic blackberries. Well, Dr. Clark, after, you know, 25 years at the helm of the fruit breeding program, you announced a couple of years ago that you are phasing down and getting ready to retire at the end of 2022. After all that time, what would you say is, you know, what will you miss the most from this job? 

Dr. Clark: What would I miss most? Well, you know, I've worked at the university now going on 42 years total and so pretty used to come to work so that, you know, that excitement, that stimulation, but also that challenge, you know, and that perseverance and a certain amount of discipline that's all kind of built in for a lifetime. So probably that inspiration of the job would probably be a key thing. 

But that's OK. You know, times change, you know? Dr. Worthington joined us in 2016. She has an enthusiasm that I think sometimes is outside of anything I ever have. She has training in areas that I don't have, so it's kind of one of those things you like all that, kind of that you'd get out of the way because there's a whole new time coming. 

Dr. Worthington and our whole fruit breeding team, our team at our Fruit Research Station at Clarksville. That's a whole bunch of new enthusiastic young people that are ready to roll. So my final thing is just try to prepare the genetics the best I can, tell the stories I think are really pertinent and get out of the way.

Kordsmeier: Well, speaking of stories, speaking of inspiration, one thing that you do that I think probably makes you stand out against all the berry breeders in the world is whenever you release a new variety, you pair a song that you composed with it. So, so when we make our videos about the videos, about the blackberries, we're using the music that you compose. Can you tell us how that came to be and where your inspiration comes for those songs? 

Dr. Clark: Well, the songs and the structure of the songs are just acoustic guitar compositions, no words.

And so no one should expect to have a blackberry song, but that's not really what we need for these. So when we started making YouTube videos beginning in 2013, I suggested just using a little guitar part for a prelude and post glued to the to the video.

And that grew into this composition for specific varieties. So it was not numerous ones for the various crops and the blackberries. I usually like to compose a song specific for the variety, so if we take Ponca, Ponca is one of my favorite blackberries.

And so it took several months for me to kind of design how the Ponca song which on our name, the song, "Some Kinda Mighty Fine" song for Ponca is officially what it's called. And so that that song is designed to kind of share a little bit about the about the fruit.

It starts out with a either a fifth or a ninth, which is a little bit like what, tart? Sounds like it tastes like. 

And then the song moves into more melodic components to it, which are like, 'wow, this thing is really good.'

And the song finishes up with a kind of a celebration type part to it, with strumming and faster moving and some nice balance. You know, I don't know if that makes any sense and they may be right, but that's something I added here

And it's something, I learned how to play guitar I think back in high school, and it's nice to have this added to this career. And of course, like anything, when you're playing more and practice more, you get better, so that it's kind of like plant breeding. The more you do, theoretically, the better you get.

Kordsmeier: Well, as we close out the segment, we'll listen to the tune for Ponca. So, Dr. Clark, any final thoughts before we close out the segment?

[“Some Kinda Mighty Fine,” tune for Ponca Blackberry by John Clark plays in background]

Dr. Clark: All I can say is, boy, it's been a joy to work at the University of Arkansas for a career. I got one year left and you know, I want it to be graceful and productive and fulfilling. And I think it will be to finish this career off.

I have many thanks to the university and the Division of Agriculture for this opportunity. So good times on a lot of them.

Kordsmeier: Well, we appreciate you coming on, Dr. Clark. Thanks very much.

Dr. Clark: Thank you.

[Short musical interlude between segments]

[26:45] Kordsmeier: A big thank you to Dr. Clark and Debbie Wisdom and Chand Harwell for participating in this episode of Arkansas Food, Farms and Forests. If you’d like to stay in the loop with the Arkansas Agricultural Experiment Station, please like and subscribe to this podcast. You can also follow our news coverage at aaes.uada.edu/news. We’ll be back in 2022 with new episodes and more great content. Thanks for joining for this episode of Arkansas Food, Farms and Forests.

[27:12] Conclusion: The Arkansas Food Farms and Forests podcast is produced by the Arkansas Agricultural Experiment Station, the research arm of the University of Arkansas System Division of Agriculture. Visit AAES.UADA.EDU for more information.