This week like every year around this time, I went to the always sunny,
Naples Florida for our Gnetic Putity Field Trials. Normally, we would
plan for 2 days, however, this time around we had more crops to evaluate
than normal, so we planned for 3 full days. On this trial, we had
peppers, sweet corn, watermelons, and squash.
The problem with these trips is how early our day starts, and how long
our traveling day is. I woke up around 3:30 in the morning for a 5:30 AM
departure, BOI (Boise) to MSP (Minneapolis)
Here [MSP] we have a 4-5 hour layover, so we relax, drink, and go for
walks around the airport, mostly walks actually and very little drinking
or relaxing 🤣.
After a 3-hour flight, we make it to Naples. By this point we're so
tired that there is to check in at the hotel, find the closest place to
eat, no matter what it is, eat, and go to bed.
Day One
Sweet Corn and Watermelon
Our plan for our first day was to knock out our Sweet Corn
trial and possibly start with our Watermelon.
It was mostly uneventful. The plants, and field looked well overall, slightly overgrown but we could still get the data we needed. We managed to do close to halfway in the first three hours or so and decided to go back to the site for more water and such. And then it happened.
We got stuck! 😆. It is deep loose sand and this, is how we found out, our car wasn't AWD. Weak sause! Nothing, one of the field workers came around and helped us out.
Once we made it to the site, we ran up to the Watermelon breeder for the Americas, who happened to have some small trials down there so we changed our plans and asked him for help with our watermelon trial. We had a particular variety that was somewhat problematic and what better than to evaluate said variety with the breeder?
This particular variety is supposed to be a seedless watermelon. Normally, on a seedless watermelon, the main concern is that there are female fruits in the batch. Under normal circumstances, the difference between the hybrid fruit and the female aver visible, so whatever fruit is questionable, we would cut it open, and if there are seeds present, that's an indication of the presence of the female. No seeds? That's the expected hybrid. Unfortunately for us, on this variety, the difference between the 2 isn't visible at all, they both look the same. This means we need to cut every single fruit open. We have two different batches at 450 seeds/plants each with one to two fruits per plant so that'd be roughly 900 plus fruits. And the worst of it, we only have one knife/machete to cut this open. Well, our breeder had one so we had two but he was leaving that very same day.
We only managed to do a third of the first batch on that afternoon, not only we were going slow but it was hot as hell! The most bizarre thing about this particular variety is that we would cut them open and find nothing but one seed, we would crack that seed open and find it had endosperm. So in theory, that one seed is viable, so is it a seeded watermelon, even if it's one single seed? Normally you would find multiple seeds not just one. This puzzled even the breeder. So now we are in a situation where we don't only need to cut our fruit in quarters but also snap seeds open.
And so, our day one concluded. Later we had some good local beer and we visited Island Gypsy Cafe | Naples, Florida for some amazing Blackened Mutton Snapper with broccoli and mashed potatoes.
It was a really nice relaxing evening by the docks.
Day Two
Sweet Corn and Squash After being somewhat overwhelmed by the amount of work we figured our problematic watermelon variety was going to take, we decided to knock out the easy crops. We finished Sweet Corn in the morning and Squash in the afternoon. A pretty uneventful and straightforward day. We celebrated our day with more local beer and Cuban food at Fernandez The Bull.
Day Three
Peppers and the Problematic Watermelon
Our plan for day three was to knock out those damn watermelons and be done with it. By this day I was already mentally checked out. But as it always goes, the universe had other plans. The lady in charge of making our field trials happen suggested we should take a look at the peppers. Well shit! The. thing is, that neither one of us has evaluated peppers before and this lady has more than 15 years of experience with them so we couldn't say no to that. In a way, it was a pleasant change of plans. I don't know how to explain it but there was something nice about evaluating peppers, it was fun, maybe because we were learning something new, a new crop we had never worked on before in this setting.
We learned so much in that 2 hours of evaluating peppers. Now I am peppers certified!
Some people say that Florida is the Australia of the US, and they are mostly right. Many insects and animals may try to kill you. This site is not exempt from any of these. There have been many stories of panthers and bears roaming the field and of course gators. And after 4 to 5 years of visiting this site, we finally witnessed one, actually, two.
I didn't bother to take a picture of the second one for whatever reason, but they both looked pretty big. Then, we were told these were pretty small compared to the ones they actually encounter often.
After some cool distractions, it was time to deal with our problem child.
After a lot of cutting, bending over, and grabbing fruits we were done with these, and needless to say we were worked and spent.
It was time for some local beer and the hotel bar, good seafood, and perhaps a shot of tequila too.
Unfortunately, we did not get to finish.
Luckily, our flight out of Fort Myers did not leave until late afternoon so we planned for one more day at our trial, in the morning. We still had other watermelon varieties that needed evaluating, fortunately, these dint need to be cut in half. This time around we had help from one of the field workers, I explained what we were looking for, and divided and conquered.
Went back to the hotel, showered, packed, and headed out to Old Naples Pub for lunch. Which we found out, that it'll be closing at the end of the month. It is super-sad because it is a really good spot I was looking forward to coming back on the next trip. We had gator bites, I mean, you gotta when in Florida, right?
And some Mahi-Mahi Tacos
Then, hurry up and wait at the Airport. A very long day traveling, to get home much later than I was supposed to, not even unloading my stuff, just walked in, brushed my teeth, and crashed on the bed.
I come down to Naples twice a year every year and this is my 5th year doing this and I have to say, workload-wise, this was the most brutal and exhausting trip/trial I have ever experienced.
I am extremely happy to be back, plus, this week was also Annie's birthday and our 16th wedding anniversary.
