Life blooms in a dark basement not far from Moscow’s Main Street. This year, 50 varieties of sprouting tomatoes reached toward grow lights and cuddled a dusty, electric heating pad for two weeks.
Joel Hamilton, professor emeritus of the Department of Agricultural Economics and Rural Sociology, beamed at these tomatoes and said, “Clearly, I go for diversity.”
Hamilton said his garden includes ground cherries and, for the first time, Ida Gold tomatoes — given to him by Bill Loftus, who coordinated the distribution of three types of seeds to celebrate the University of Idaho’s 125th anniversary.
The College of Agriculture and Life Sciences began distributing seeds for Ida Gold tomatoes, Idelight Green Beans and Red Blanket Flowers in January — three seed varieties developed by UI researchers during the last half-century. Master Gardener Programs in counties throughout Idaho received the first seed deliveries.
“They are also, kind of, the uber gardeners in the Idaho communities, and we wanted to get the seeds to them so they could try them and enjoy them and spread the word about them,” Loftus said.
The college sent UI County Extension Offices their share of Idaho-made seeds for promotional events and advertising
About 3,000 packets of Idelight beans and Red Blanket Flowers made it into the hands of Idaho gardeners. Only a few months later, nearly 2,500 packets filled with Ida Gold tomato seeds had dwindled to just 20.
Idelight Green Beans, a cross developed in 1951 by Leslie Dean at the Bean Research Laboratory near Twin Falls, bears thin, 5-inch pods that are resistant to virus strains.
UI researchers Arthur Boe and Margaret Luckman developed Ida Gold tomatoes in 1982. The plants produce their small, golden fruits in just 58 days.
UI extension horticulturist Stephen Love cultivated Red Blanket Flowers — perennial, native wildflowers known for their showy displays — at the Aberdeen Research and Extension Center in Washington, then bred them selectively for three or four generations. Today’s leggy plants are drought-resistant and grow up to 30 inches tall.
UI’s involvement with plant breeding and genetics rarely makes headlines, but genetic modification of seeds and crops has become a controversial issue.
Jack Brown, a geneticist, plant breeder and professor at UI, said modification at the recombinant DNA level seldom occurs at UI. Recombinant DNA modification brings together genetic material from multiple sources, creating an organism that wouldn’t occur in nature.
Brown said people think genetic modification is gene splicing — for example, taking a gene from bacteria, combining it with a couple of genes from a daffodil and sticking it into rice, so that the rice produces beta-carotene, which is a precursor to vitamin A and will help prevent blindness.
In reality, Genetically Modified Organisms do not always feature genes from more than one organism, Brown said.
He said he has never genetically modified a plant using recombinant DNA. Partially because he said he’s never needed to, and partially because those funding him didn’t want him to.
Brown said the newness of genetic modification makes people uneasy about its implementation. But most people don’t even understand the process, he said, and many believe it involves something like putting monkey genes into potatoes.
That isn’t what it is.
But Brown isn’t about to promise that this technology can make the world a better place.
“Frankly, it’s not done that yet,” Brown said. “I’m not saying it’s not going to do that in the future, but it’s certainly not done that yet.”
Genetically modified or not, Loftus said Ida Golds, Idelights and Red Blanket Flowers have affected and will affect Idaho’s economy and population for years to come.
Written by Jake Smith