Once in a Life time Opportunities!

I will admit, I am falling behind in keeping recent 4-H things posted. A few weeks ago my Red Dirt Diggers gardening club went on a field trip. It was amazing, we planned it all out and used club money we had received from the fair. This was our first actual club field trip and I was happy to see all of our members attend! We had all 14 of us go, all the way to Asheville.
The trip was very cool. We went on a tour through the Mountain Horticulture Research Center. There we met Dr. Dilip R. Panthee, a man from Nepal who has completed major accomplishments in tomato science...for lack of better words. We met several other people who work in the research center, some of whom were just recognized by NC State as being "The Best Of The Best". It was a really amazing learning experience.

Dr. Dilip R. Panthee
Visit Him Here!

The Best of The Best

Behind him is a screened in area that they release honey bees
into, to pollinate just certain plants. Keeping Honey bees, that
was very interesting for me to see! 

Our group looking over the ornamental plants in the green house.  

Mr. Nathan Lynch -in the middle- was one of the men
recognized as being "The Best Of The Best".

Here is a bloom from a blah tree. See all the little white tags?
Each tag was on a single branch coming off of the tree, and each
tag was a different cultivar of flower on that single tree! 

Mrs. Jeanine Davis was exceptional
with the information she provided us
with about how there is great possibility
of us getting a chance in the hort. department.

 Showing us that only a handful of these green plants wll
become a yellow variety and then singled down to ONE plant.

Over a three year time span. 

Dr. Panthee said that it takes about Nine seasons for him to create a single tomato variety. In the conditions that he works in, the greenhouses, the temperatures in Asheville and the unique way they are able to handle things at the research facility, Dr. Panthee can create the variety in just Three years instead of Nine. That to me is remarkable! It was great to see and learn about all they were doing up there...and the amount of time it took to accomplish even the smallest of things! I highly recommend you try to go visit, or tour sometime in your life. You will love it, and walk away amazed. 

Gabby .V.