The winemakers’ art relies on the cultivation of select varieties of well-adapted grapes that thrive under sets of conditions unique to every site. The French have a single vocabulary word, “terroir,” to describe this broad set of interacting factors that includes the soils, their orientation, grape variety, farming practices, climate, local microclimate, wine making culture […]
Commercial Agriculture
Jersey Crowds Brave the Sunshine to Taste Tomatoes: 2014 Tomato Tasting at Rutgers Snyder Farm
Armed with plastic forks, a crowd descended upon Rutgers Snyder Research Farm in Pittstown on August 27 to attend the Annual Snyder Farm Open House and Great Tomato Tasting. Tasters had an offering of eighty varieties of tomatoes to taste from as well as basil, peaches, apples and honey. The samplings provided a glimpse of […]
What’s in Season from the Garden State: Making Bucks from Clucks, Not Books
Historically, young people were taught a trade by serving as apprentices or learning the ropes from a relative in a family business. While modern education emphasizes learning through books, classroom and lab experience, academia has increasingly embraced the value of hands-on involvement and commonly provides students opportunities for fieldwork or internships. Agricultural entrepreneurship offers its […]
How the Game of Golf Adapts to Global Warming
Want to see the future of turf grass? It’s growing at Rutgers University in a “library” of grasses on thousands of 4-foot by 6-foot research plots – 12,000 plots exclusively for bent grasses destined for golf courses…”We have by far the largest reserve of genes of cool-season grasses anywhere in the world,” said William Meyer, director of Rutgers’ turf grass breeding program. “Our whole breeding objective is to develop turf grasses that require lower inputs – of energy, fertilizer, fungicide, and insecticide. We’re working on all angles.”
Alumni Story: Phillip Alampi, ‘Mr. Garden State’
Editor’s Note: One of the most prestigious honors conferred on alumni of Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, is induction into the Hall of Distinguished Alumni (HDA). The School of Environmental and Biological Sciences is proud of its 16 HDA honorees. This is one of a series of stories about them. A first-generation American, […]
Female Farmers Focus of Webinar
In 1900, almost half of U.S. residents made their living on farms. Now it is barely 1 percent. There are about 800,000 full-time farmers in America today. According to the last census, fewer than 20 percent are women. In 2011, Annie’s Project N.J. star…
Alumni Story: Nick Vorsa (Cook’76), Better Cranberries Through Science
Nicholi Vorsa (Cook’76, GSNB ’85) is director of the Philip E. Marucci Center for Blueberry and Cranberry Research and Extension in Chatsworth, N.J. He and his team have developed new varieties of cranberries that have offered many improvements for commercial production. The story of his work in collecting cranberry germplasm and mapping its genome appeared […]
Rutgers Biotech Collaboration with B1G Member Ohio State Incorporates Partnership with University of São Paulo
Plant biotechnologists at Rutgers and Ohio State are working together to harness renewable energy from agricultural crops. This arrangement is incorporating a longstanding partnership with University of São Paulo (USP) in Brazil. The connection both schools previously held with USP was spurred by retiree and alum, Rod Sharp (GSNB ’67-Botany) who was the dean of […]
Rutgers NJAES Board of Managers’ Listening Session Looks at Expanding Board Representation
A Rutgers New Jersey Agricultural Experiment Station (NJAES) Board of Managers Listening Session was hosted by NJAES, the NJAES Board of Managers (BOM), the New Jersey Department of Agriculture, the New Jersey State Board of Agriculture and the New Jersey Farm Bureau at the Rutgers EcoComplex in Bordentown on July 17. The BOM is an […]
What’s in Season from the Garden State: Legendary Jersey Tomatoes and the Role NJ Farmers Played in Selecting Winners
Alumni Note: Rutgers’ work in tomato breeding was greatly influenced by the farm families growing test plants for the university. These families in turn were influenced by their connection to Rutgers. Read about Joe Musumeci’s (CAES ’67) journey from the family farm to Rutgers. Several of the classic Jersey tomato varieties that were grown on […]
