Posts Tagged ‘Dr. Dan Barney’

Hi there, my name’s Patrick and I’m growing huckleberries in Perth, Australia!

I’m nearly 16 weeks into the process and have some lovely little seedlings so far. We’re getting well into an Australian summer so a couple haven’t survived the hot weather (maximum temps of at least 30C/86F and up to 37C/100F this week), but most are big and strong enough to cope.

A little bit of background – I fell in love with huckleberries when I moved to Portland, OR a couple of years ago. My wife got a job back in Australia, so before I moved I hiked up into the Mt Hood wilderness and picked some berries to collect the seeds. I checked it all out with AQIS to make sure that the seeds were allowed in the country and planted them a couple of weeks after I got back in early Spring. Prof Barney’s book is fantastic, I emailed him before I left for Australia and he was very encouraging, too. So far, the seedlings are growing in old cherry tomato punnets in “native plant striking mix” – my Dad’s a plant pathologist and raises Australian native plants with it. We tried transplanting a few seedlings a couple of weeks ago but I think the potting mix had too much nitrogen and they didn’t make it.

At the moment, we’re just maintaining them through the hot weather, fertilizing every 2-4 weeks and then when we get some cooler weather, we’re planning to transfer them to individual pots. I’ll upload some photos of the seedlings, too. I haven’t quite worked out yet how to get them cold enough to go dormant during winter without exposing them to frost. Might have to buy an old fridge…

Kinsey Barnard’s Photos and Real Life Adventures: Huckleberries …

By kotybear2002@msn.com (Kinsey Barnard)

So when I moved to Montana and heard people extolling the virtues of wild huckleberries the subject got a big yawn from me. When I found out how tiny the little dickens are and how long it takes to get an edible portion I was even less …

The Moody Chronicles – Wish I would hung out with the dogs instead.

By moodypdx
The Huckleberry Festival was one of those things. I think we may have arrived a bit too early in my excitement to be there. We arrived and the pancake breakfast was there as promised, and so was the Indian flat bread, …

The differences between growing blueberries and huckleberries

Helium
by Rex Trulove Blueberries and huckleberries are quite similar in many ways. The bushes and even the berries look alike, they have the same requirements for …

Think: Bowmans: If only it were raining Huckleberries….

By She Made Mention
However, the weather wasn’t what we were hoping for to do our annual huckleberry picking. Normally, we make a night out of it and camp…. but we have to milk our darn goat, so of course we didn’t camp. We picked huckleberries in the …

Hard Times for Huckleberry Picking – yearofplenty

By Craig Goodwin
All reports I’ve been hearing from friends and wild crafters at the Farmers’ Market is that it’s been a down year for picking huckleberries. Friends that go to the same spot every year who usually get 6 or 7 gallons…

Huckleberries at Umbrella Falls (Mt. Hood Meadows)

By admin
From there, hike up to Umbrella Falls, and munch on huckleberries all the way down. If you don’t get enough huckleberry on this hike, check out the Huckleberry Fest coming up this weekend (see side column.) Tags: Waterfalls …

Rising Wolf Eats: Montana Huckleberries

By Rising Wolf Eats
One might think I’m uninformed when I say that Montana huckleberries aren’t like any other huckleberries to be found…anywhere. Every year when huckleberry season comes around, floods of adventurous people trudge out to where the wild …

Pie #34- Huckleberry « Paula’s Pie Project Blog

(I think I bought huckleberry jam once as a gift for someone, but that is as close as I have gotten.) Come to think of it, I have never seen huckleberries …

PR: wait… I: wait… L: wait… LD: wait… I: wait… wait… Rank: wait… Traffic: wait… Price: wait… C: wait…

SANDPOINT — The University of Idaho’s Research and Extension Center here will be mothballed, according to staffers.

Dr. Dan Barney, known for his huckleberry research at the facility on Boyer Avenue, said he was told that the station where he has spent 22 years, will be shuttered as of June 30 in the face of university budget shortfalls.

“I was notified last Friday,” he said. “Our job here is to completely decommission the station and get it into some type of long-term storage situation.”

Read the rest of the story ….

Five pints at a time

Daily Inter Lake – Kalispell,MT,USA
The shop, which has been a fixture on Electric Avenue in Bigfork for 30 years, is inside a quaint house featuring huckleberry decorations on the front porch …

American Indian Food: Huckleberries

Plants were important to the Plateau tribes. They gathered over 130 different plants. Two of the most important food plants for the tribes of this area were huckleberries and camas…

Deep fried bull testicles? Chew on this

PerthNow – Perth,WA,Australia
Most Australians are familiar with the name Huckleberry thanks to Mark Twain’s classic … Huckleberries are harvested by hand and used in pies, milkshakes, …

A North Idaho Agricultural Research Center Faces Closure

KUOW NPR – Seattle,WA,USA
Way up in the Idaho Panhandle, Danny Barney has been discovered — by huckleberry lovers, anyway. Barney is a horticulture professor and head of the …

Article also includes a quote from Malcolm Dell who is one of the founders of this organization and website.

Larry Lyons: Solving the great huckleberry mystery
Niles Daily Star – Niles,MI,USA
In last week’s column I mentioned attending a Potawatomi Indian Pow Wow commemorating the end of the huckleberry harvest season. Boy, did that open up a can …

I finished harvesting the breeder plants and evaluated a few thousand more seedlings. Three of the selections continued to be outstanding and another very good. If possible, I want to release these by 2012 or sooner. A few selections had only limited numbers of fruit, but quite large. They’ll serve as parents for more crosses. I’ve attached some photos.

Reports are that berry crops are heavy and fruit size is good at lower elevations. Priest Lake sounds especially productive. I expect the size and yields to drop at higher elevations unless we receive some moisture and cooler weather.

Best wishes,

Danny L. Barney, Ph.D.
Professor of Horticulture
Superintendent
University of Idaho
Sandpoint Research & Extension Center
1904 North Boyer Avenue
Sandpoint, ID 83864
Phone: 208-263-2323
Fax: 208-263-4470
Email: dbarney@uidaho.edu
Website: http://www.ag.uidaho.edu/sandpoint/index.htm

In case you have missed it, there has been a very interesting discussion going on about the use of huckleberry rakes.  Historically, opinions on this issue are strong on both sides and  the discussions here are no different!  Click on the following links to read the posts and/or to post comments of your own!

Original post by Katie:

From katie g on New Huckleberry Rakes In Stock!

Raping the huckleberry plant with a “Huckleberry Rake” should be illegal as these plants are difficult enough to find and …

Response post by “Mr. Huckleberry”:

From Mr. Huckleberry on New Huckleberry Rakes In Stock!

Greetings, Katie, I appreciate your passion for the huckleberry resource! However, if you had ever seen a huckleberry rake used, you would …

After reading the discussions, what are your thoughts?

Contacts: John Hammel, College of Agricultural and Life Sciences dean, (208) 885-7694, calsdean@uidaho.edu; Bill Loftus, CALS science writer, (208) 885-7694, bloftus@uidaho.edu

College Considers Planning Process

For Closure of Research and Extension Centers

Written by Bill Loftus

MOSCOW – The University of Idaho College of Agricultural and Life Sciences will involve faculty, staff and stakeholder groups around the state in its planning for the proposed closures of research and extension centers.

The college and University of Idaho Extension operate 12 research and extension centers throughout the state, and another based on the Moscow campus that oversees nearby facilities.

College of Agricultural and Life Sciences Dean John Hammel outlined the proposal during a recent presentation to the Idaho Legislature’s Joint Finance – Appropriations Committee.

Hammel said the college plans to form a planning committee with broad membership from internal and external groups interested in the research and extension centers to help the college’s leadership assess the options.

The college will await legislative action on the state’s agricultural research and extension appropriation, which is not expected until late March, before the college finalizes its plan.

Hammel said the college’s leaders reviewed all available options before arriving at the proposal. The controlling factor was the agricultural research and extension budget is mostly dedicated to salaries. Only $3.3 million in operating funding is available to fund maintenance, program support, capital outlay and travel.

“We have little flexibility in our operating budget and we must not continue to markedly erode these resources,” Hammel said. “Doing so will severely limit our capability to adequately support our existing research and extension programs, many of which are already underfunded, and to address future priorities driven by the changing landscape of Idaho agriculture, communities and our clientele.”

The closure of two or more centers is the college’s proposed response to expected cuts totaling 7 percent or $1.94 million in the college’s agricultural research and extension appropriation from the state for fiscal 2010, which begins July 1.

In addition to the center closures to save approximately $1 million, Hammel said the college planned to eliminate 15 vacant faculty and staff positions to save $800,000 and cut travel budgets by 25 percent.

In a memo last week to the college’s faculty and staff, Hammel said no centers have been chosen for closure and the process to determine which centers would close under the plan has not begun.

Hammel said he will seek recommendations from those within the college and university and those who rely on the centers to keep Idaho agriculture healthy and competitive.

“We must stress that no centers and programs are currently targeted and that we have not yet initiated the review process,” Hammel said.

Some of the criteria that will be used to evaluate the centers will include:

*Current and future relevance

*Impact on industry and the specific industry sector affected by closure *Program priorities across Idaho *Potential partnerships or collaborations to meet need.

The list of criteria is not final, nor are the exact parameters that will govern the decisions, Hammel said, adding, “We will communicate the finalized review process and the criteria by which these actions will be determined.

About the University of Idaho

Founded in 1889, the University of Idaho is the state’s flagship higher-education institution and its principal graduate education and research university, bringing insight and innovation to the state, the nation and the world. University researchers attract nearly $100 million in research grants and contracts each year; the University of Idaho is the only institution in the state to earn the prestigious Carnegie Foundation ranking for high research activity. The university’s student population includes first-generation college students and ethnically diverse scholars. Offering more than 150 degree options in 10 colleges, the university combines the strengths of a large university with the intimacy of small learning communities. For information, visit www.uidaho.edu

Bill Loftus, Science writer

Educational Communications

College of Agricultural and Life Sciences University of Idaho

W: (208) 885-7694, C: (208) 301-3566, F: (208) 885-9046

Ag Science 18, Sixth and Rayburn P.O. Box 442332, Moscow, ID 83844

January 20, 2009

I’m still here. Officially, I leave on 1 April. When I actually can get into the Sawtooth depends on the snow levels. Between now and April 1, I will also be taking 10 days off for annual leave. It’s either use it or lose it and I can use the time to get ready for my trip.

As for the interviews, probably sooner than later would be best and Fridays are tentative.

Thanks for the invitation; I can join the wild huckleberry group any time, just let me know what I need to do.

As for what is up, you may have heard that the UI and all other state universities and agencies are faced with major cuts. We have already had a 13% budget cut in operations and are facing more. Hopefully, we’ll survive. I have quite a few plants started for spring 2010 distribution to cooperators. I was able to do a rather thorough job of evaluating
fruit last summer and a few selections appear to be superior, in terms of fruit size and yields.

I am preparing a grant proposal to establish huckleberries, bilberries, and beargrass onto private forest ground near Sandpoint. This would be a great site for workshops as it has a nice building that is being remodeled for educational programs. I’ll be using what we already know and what I learn this year to base the trials on. The idea is to refine our management strategies for wild huckleberries and bilberries, with an eye to sustainable commercial harvests.

I also have been developing a plan for an organic and sustainable research & Extension Center near our existing farm. The budget crisis has put crimps into that, but I am hoping to get some outside grants that will cover the cost of developing the new farm. Organically-grown huckleberries and bilberries will be one of the main research projects.

Hope all is well for you.

February 5, 2009

Last week, the University of Idaho College of Agricultural & Life Sciences announced that at least 2 of the 13 Research & Extension Centers statewide will be closed due to expected state budget cuts. I’ve attached the official press release.

Because Sandpoint is one of the two smallest stations, we are a likely candidate for closure. At this time, the College does not plan to fire tenured faculty. Those affected, however, may have to relocate to Moscow or one of the other centers. How this will affect our huckleberry research, I do not know. I do know that the soils, climate, and location at Sandpoint make it an ideal place to study wild and domestic huckleberries. At present, we have plants in our nursery that should be ready for shipping in the spring of 2010 to cooperators. For those stations that are closed, we do not know yet how quickly they will be closed following the final decisions, which should come in mid May 2009.

I am requesting that my sabbatical leave to study wild huckleberries and bilberries be postponed for one year. I was supposed to be on leave in the berry fields of Washington from April-September 2009. I’ll need to be here to assist in the evaluation and selection process, act as a contact point for clientele and the public, and close the station, should that be necessary.

If you believe that this information would be of interest to the International Wild Huckleberry Association, I encourage you to pass this message along to the members. Decisions on which stations will be closed will partly depend on stakeholder input. If the members believe that our work has benefitted them and the industry, I would appreciate their
making that known to Dean Hammel and participating in the stakeholder process.

Thanks for the support you have provided over the years.

April 21, 2009

The blue ribbon panel convened to decide which R&E Centers will be closed met last weekend. Now it’s in the Dean’s court to make the final decisions. We should know by May 15 of this year. Lots of things could happen, one or two of them even good.

For now, I am working feverishly to establish new selections in vitro and back up all plants with multiple copies. I also started the breeding for 2009 today, planning on 31 crosses this year. I have many F1 seedlings from 2005-2006 crosses. Those seedlings are one year old and in the greenhouse. I want back up seed for all of the crosses between our best selections, just in case we have to move or shut down the UI program. I believe the last possibility is remote, but I’m not taking any chances. I’ll also be making more seed collection trips this summer to fill in gaps and replace aging seed from our first collections from sources that have proven good. We have about 4,000 seedlings from
2004-2006 crosses and open pollinated seedlings from wild collections in the greenhouse. More are in the bark beds and we have plants ready to go for a fall 2009 or spring 2010 distribution to growers.

I have tentative plans to offer two workshops at Sandpoint this summer, about the second or third week of July. The first workshop will be huckleberry cultivation for home gardeners. The second will be cultivation for commercial production. Until we know for sure what is going to happen here, the plans are tentative.

Depending on where or if I will be working for UI, the prospects are excellent for a large grant to study introduction of huckleberries, bilberries, and beargrass into forest areas where those plants are no longer found. It will be a great opportunity to test our model management systems for wild huckleberries. If things are a go, funding could start as early as this summer.

May 21, 2009

I am buried in research right now trying to preserve our most important germplasm and selections in case my station is closed. Although the controlled pollinations are done for the year, we are just starting tissue culture and cutting propagation, and will move from that into harvesting breeder trials and replacing old seed collections in the core germplasm collection.

Best wishes,

Danny L. Barney, Ph.D.
Professor of Horticulture
Superintendent
University of Idaho
Sandpoint Research & Extension Center
1904 North Boyer Avenue
Sandpoint, ID 83864
Phone: 208-263-2323
Fax: 208-263-4470
Email: dbarney@uidaho.edu
Website: http://www.ag.uidaho.edu/sandpoint/index.htm

February 14, 2008

(In response to an information request from Europe)

I suggest you visit my website at www.ag.uidaho.edu/sandpoint. We have a great deal of information on the different huckleberry and bilberry species, including how to grow them.

The names huckleberry, bilberry, whortleberry, and blueberry are interchangeable and it is not unusual for a single plant to be called all of these names. There are also many different plants in at least two families and three genera that are called huckleberries. As far as what is a “true” huckleberry, it is a common name and widely used for many plants.

I work with Vaccinium species that are native to western North America, although some of the species are also found across North America and some in Asia and Europe. With one exception, alpine bilberry, Vaccinium uliginosum, all are found in genus Vaccinium section Myrtillus.

One species I work with is Vaccinium myrtillus. We call it bilberry or dwarf huckleberry in North America. It is best known as bilberry in Europe and is commercially harvested from the wild in Scandinavia and probably elsewhere. Bilberry has a long history of use for medicinal and culinary purposes. This would be by far the easiest huckleberry to obtain in Germany. The fruits are smaller than mountain and Cascade huckleberries native to the eastern U.S., but the flavor is excellent.

Red huckleberry, Vaccinium parvifolium, is first cousin to both bilberry and the large-fruited mountain and Cascade huckleberries. It is also found in section Myrtillus. The fruits are a bright red and tend to be quite tart. Red huckleberry has low anthocyanin and antioxidant concentrations and also lacks the strong flavor components of the Cascade and mountain huckleberries or bilberry. Red huckleberry is harvested commercially from the wild and used primarily, I believe, for pastries.

April 3, 2008

We still have no idea how our huckleberries fared the winter. They are still covered by 19 inches of snow. Nice insulation. I’m especially anxious to see how the bark beds turned out.

My primary focus now is getting the huckleberry cultivars developed, with most other projects on hold. I’ll be starting seed from crosses I did in 2008 and making more crosses early next month. We also have quite a few young plants ready for the greenhouse. On the positive front, I believe I have identified a main problem with tissue culturing some ofour selections. A different iron compound in the medium seems to be largely preventing the poor growth and death we have with many of the selections. I need to run a few more tests, but I think we will be able to turn out many more test plants for cooperators.

I will be in Alaska from June 14-30th and in Oregon July 13-17. In late August and early September, I will be making some trips to Lolo Pass and probably a few other huckleberry sites to collect samples. Most of the summer and fall will be spent getting ready for my sabbatical next summer.

Hope all is going well

March 4, 2008

Winter has not been too bad, just more than average snow and it hasstayed for a very long time. We still have about 24 inches on the level at our farm. Good for the plants. We had plenty of snow cover for insulation.

The new UI campus at Sandpoint is still on hold. The Wild rose Foundation put everything on hold when Coldwater Creek share prices dropped from $25 to $8. The prices are now down to $5.40 and I don’t see a turnaround soon.

Mr. Pence did donate 18 acres of land for a new experimental farm. About 8 acres are tillable and another couple suitable for container yards and the like. I still have to meet with the dean and director to find out what they want me to do and what I have to work with.

I’m propagating test plants as rapidly as I can and refining our in vitro techniques to establish the remaining selections. I am also starting seed from our past breeding trials. I was waiting for a new greenhouse, but that does not appear to be coming soon.

I just gave two talks on huckleberries at the pacific Agriculture Show in Abbotsford, Canada. There is some interest in producing bilberries and huckleberries in B.C.

July 18, 2008

My huckleberry crop at Sandpoint was very good, perhaps a couple of weeks late. Most cultivated crops are running two to three weeks later than usual throughout the region due to a long, cold spring.

The Priest Lake crop at about 2,600 feet looked average to above average in early June. I have not been back to see the ripe fruit, but probably will be next Thursday or Friday. I’ve been gone most of the past month to Alaska and Oregon.

I expect to have a good lower elevation crop early. Fruit size should be average to above average. The higher elevation crop is likely to be problematic due to little rain and high temperatures. I would rather expect a sporadic crop, with reasonably good yields on cooler, moister sites and few or small berries on drier sites.

I just returned from the International Vaccinium conference. Lots of good information that applies to huckleberries and bilberries. We should be able to greatly refine our nursery production of planting stock. Also, researchers in Norway, Finland, and Ukraine are working to domesticate bilberry (V. myrtillus) but are not as far along as we are. We are sharing information and, hopefully, germplasm. Their germplasm resources are incredible and we can offer help in propagation and production methodologies. All of us should profit from the exchange.

Breeding went well for mountain huckleberry this spring and terribly for oval-leaved bilberry. Practically no fruit set on the latter. We have made more selections of V. myrtillus and planted out F1 seed for many crosses in 2006. One of the V. myrtillus plants has very large berries. Baby crops can be deceiving, but it looks promising and is very late, as well. The raised bed and bark bed trials are doing exceptionally well and bore fruit this year.

We have the land for the new farm, so it looks like we are going to be in business for a long while. The site is a mess, however, and will take a few years to clean up and get into production. We expect to begin fruit plantings there in 2010 and 2011. I will be distributing planting stock in 2010 to cooperators.

July 30, 2008

I’ve managed to get into the high country a bit and the crops in northern Idaho look good so far. Fruit set was very good at all elevations I have been at and across a fairly wide area. I finished picking my crop at the Sandpoint R&E Center (2,000 feet elevation) on July 11. I noted pickers in the 3,000 foot elevation range last week and berries seem to be both abundant and quite large at that elevation. Higher up, the berries are still green but set abundantly and seem to be sizing up well.

We’re getting a little more moisture than last year, but it is still very dry and higher elevation berries are likely to be rather smaller than those lower down that are already ripe.

We’ve made more bilberry selections this year (V. myrtillus) and the market demand worldwide is very strong. I just returned from the International Vaccinium Conference where I met with researchers from Finland, Norway, and the Ukraine who are also working to manage or domesticate bilberry. We are sharing information and prospects for the industry appear excellent. Demand is especially great in Europe for the bilberry, but niche markets in the U.S. and Canada could easily be expanded with a little creative marketing.

We have had great success with growing huckleberries and bilberries in raised beds and bark beds under hybrid poplar. I’ll update our website and get information for the Western Huckleberry and Bilberry Association website early this fall.

Please feel free to contact me with questions and success stories.

November 5, 2008

Starting a new industry and fruit breeding can be slow and frustrating. At least we are making good progress on improved varieties and growing practices, as well as forest stand management. I should have a great deal of new information after next year’s sabbatical leave project in the Sawtooth. We are also propagating planting stock for a 2010 distribution.

I appreciate the support and should be able to link your new site to my existing huckleberry pages. Please let me know how you would like to proceed.

Thanks and good luck.

September 7, 2008

Right now I am tied up with a number of projects, including propagating huckleberries and getting ready for sabbatical. I’m also developing agrant for huckleberry studies establishing and managing berries in forest stands. Should be a perfect case study for your site.

Best wishes,

Danny L. Barney, Ph.D.
Professor of Horticulture
Superintendent
University of Idaho
Sandpoint Research & Extension Center
1904 North Boyer Avenue
Sandpoint, ID 83864
Phone: 208-263-2323
Fax: 208-263-4470
Email: dbarney@uidaho.edu
Website: http://www.ag.uidaho.edu/sandpoint/index.htm