A Seedling Is A Seedling-Not True!!!

By: Mark Coggeshall

Tree Improvement Specialist with theIndiana Department of Natural Resources at the Vallonia Tree Nursery

Nursery personnel also have many objectives in mind - foremost is to insure that the customer will receive seedlings of the highest quality. Sounds like a perfect match doesn't it? If it were only that simple. In Indiana, the Department of Natural Resources, Division of Forestry operates two award winning nurseries which annually produce over 5 million seedlings of 30 different species. In order to accomplish this task, the nursery team must focus attention on all areas of seedlings production - from collection and sowing of the seed, to the growing and shipping of the seedlings.

We strive to grow the appropriate species to meet the customer's needs for timber production, windbreaks, wildlife enhancement and erosion control, but we also focus on the best seed sources to use. Since we serve so many customers (over 10,000 annually) throughout the state, each species must be broadly adapted to grow on many different sites, while meeting the objectives of the landowner.

Where and how the seeds are acquired by the State nurseries can be of great importance to the customer in the long run. It is important to recognize that all tree species have natural genetic variation. These genetic differences insures that the species as a whole will continue to survive and reproduce. As we learn more about the genetic variation present within a species, we can begin to make decisions on which sources of seed that would be best to utilize in our nursery to produce tree seedlings- seedlings that are not only adapted to Indiana, but also capable of superior tree growth. Since 1971, the Division of Forestry has operated a Tree Improvement Program to develop genetically proven seed sources for use in the State nurseries. Over the years this program has focused on fine hardwoods species such as: Black walnut, Red oak, White oak and White ash. The results obtained have been very promising. Over 30 acres of orchards have been established, evaluated, and are now producing seeds. The most notable success has been with the Black walnut program, which is the result of a 20 year effort between the Indiana Division of Forestry and Purdue University. In 1992, seeds capable of producing 41,500 seedlings were obtained from these orchards. All of these orchards contain trees that have been shown through testing, to produce high quality offspring. Work with the oaks and ash began more recently and therefore significant seed production is still a few years away.

In order to insure that all customers have equal access to these limited number of genetically improved seedlings, the seed orchard seeds are thoroughly mixed in with our normal seed collections for sowing in the nursery beds. Another source of seed comes from the actual test plantations we established to evaluate the seed trees in our orchards. Many of these "test" trees are actually outstanding individuals and have the capacity to be good parents. Growth gains of over 30% can be achieved by using the best plantations, which are just now beginning to produce seeds.

For other tree species, we do not have sophisticated seed orchard programs in place. Instead our focus is on collecting seed from wild trees based on information collected through the Tree Improvement Program. In many cases, plantings called "seed source tests" have been established either in Indiana or other Mid-western states for species of interest. Results from these tests indicate which geographic seed sources will perform the best in our area. We use the results from these seed source tests whenever sources to use at the nurseries.