I’ve spent a lot of time among Salmonberries, usually hiking and hungry in either the Cascades or the Coast Range. Generally an insipid affair… some, often with a deep red ‘blush’ were half-decent. I’ve always been confused as to why they aren’t more prevalent in the Willamette Valley..? I’d considered transplanting a few until my brother, battling acres of them at the Oregon coast, talked me out of it. Seems they're extremely invasive on their native turf!

A cross would be interesting, though I know little about the procedure, either. Most tend to forget we’re still “Pioneers” here on the West Coast (like the guy on the top of the Oregon Capital!), with little over 150 years experience. Whereas the East Coast of America has selected and cultured blueberries, and their wild grapes... and the Mid-West’s selected their ‘wild persimmons’ - we’ve not done much with our Native’s – like Huckleberries, Salal or Salmon berries.

Seems one of our colleges could easily come up with a grant to fund some cross-breading, even now. A prolific crop of berries, likely susceptible to machine harvest, perhaps ‘disease free’ – I think we’ve neglected this opportunity! …Instead, Luther Burbank gets loads of ‘credit’ for having cross-bread the best of existing Asian plums..? Let’s get with it Northwesterners – there’s always a need for new foods

Would the viability of the berry’s seed be necessary for a commercial crop? I would assume you could/would propagate them by ‘runners or shoots.’ I wonder how viable raspberry seeds are..? If they readily reseeded that could be a problem; instead, the ones that drop appear to be sterile as nothing but ‘runners’ shoot up each spring.

…I forgot to add ‘Thimbleberries’ to my list of potential native’s… though that could take some time… breeding them with far less leaf-surface and far more fruit, if more substantial fruit.

I remember a TV program, around ten years ago, describing the “future” of plant breeding no longer having anything to do with crosses but using genetic tissue manipulation… They described “Grapes as big as golf balls!” It may have been a “NOVA” program, so I took it as fact more than hype. At the time I was still expanding my orchard so I seriously considered holding off planting several more grapes while waiting for those …Frankenstein-like genetically manipulated varieties to arrive. After running the subject by some knowledgeable HOS members, they smiled and told me they ‘wouldn’t hold their breath.’ …So I planted existing varieties … as no such grape, or anything else as far as I know has come along from that type of manipulation.

I remember when the US(DA?) shut down a number of our nations research stations and breeding programs, while Japan beefed up theirs… thus the newer apples with Japanese names. Think it’s time to ‘stimulate’ our plant research..? Open up the “Morton(?)” facility and begin working with those salmon berry crosses!