Summer Vegetable Trials: Woodland, California
Josh Kirschenbaum Business & Portfolio Manager Vegetables
Summer is certainly a busy time of year for PanAmerican Seed Company’s HandPicked Vegetable Team. Each August and September, we have field trials in several parts of the United States where we not only evaluate our commercial and experimental varieties, but we invite visitors from around the world to come and do the same.
In addition to our main trial station in Elburn, Illinois, we had field trials in Woodland, California; Hancock, Wisconsin; Hall, New York; and Aurora, Oregon.
The first trials were held in Woodland and we had visitors from Aug. 12-16, which coincided with the trials of other vegetable breeding companies in the area. (Similar format to California Spring Trials, but much less glitzy … these are rows of vegetables in a field.)
Woodland is approximately 15 miles from the city of Sacramento and the climate gives us a great opportunity to see how our genetics perform in hot, arid conditions with cool nights. Average high temperatures in August are 95 degrees F and average lows are 57 degrees F.
Some facts about this year’s trial:
- Between 50-75 visitors attended, representing approximately 20 different companies.
- Visitors included distributors, growers and members of the press.
- Countries represented included: Australia, Brazil, Mexico, New Zealand, South Africa, and United States.
- One of the media attendees (@EpicGardening seen below) posted 4 videos highlighting our varieties and his visit on Instagram. To-date they have been viewed a combined 46,000 TIMES!
To learn more about the HandPicked Vegetables Collection, click here. And if you're a fresh-market or produce farmer, be sure to check out our new resource page just for you.
