The Rutgers tomato (Lycopersicon lycopersicum), also known as the Jersey tomato or the Rutgers Select, was the most popular tomato variety in the world before the era of mechanized farming began a change in breeding for durability over flavor. It is an open pollinated beefsteak from the family Solanaceae with an excellent balance of acidity to sweetness and much flavor. [1] A true New Jersey tomato has both high acids and high sugars, and a thin skin. It lasts days at full ripeness, not weeks as modern, commercially bred tomatoes for automatic harvest and long-haul shipment, do. [2]
It was developed in 1934 by Rutgers University's New Jersey Agricultural Experiment Station and the Campbell Soup Company's Riverton, New Jersey research facility. [3] [4] [5] A hugely flavorful tomato that also was more resistant to rot than its predecessors, the Rutgers tomato became a staple ingredient of not only Campbell’s Soup, but other large companies including Hunt's and Heinz. It was popular on American dinner tables as the seed was grown by farmers nationally.
It was the most popular variety of tomato in the world, according to Thomas J. Orton, a professor in the department of plant biology and pathology at Rutgers University. [6] The Rutgers tomato, at its peak, made up more than 60% of all commercial tomato sales. [7] The Rutgers tomato plummeted in popularity with commercial farmers in the 1960s. Too thin skinned for automated picking, they fell out of favor with both farmers and commercial producers looking for hardier tomatoes that would store longer and travel farther with less spoilage. The seeds were not patented, so farmers and other companies "evolved" the Rutgers tomatoes into more refined hybrids that suited their needs better. [8]
In 2006, there was not enough commercial interest to "revive" the hybrids that were so popular from New Jersey. [9] By 2009, though, Rutgers scientists at the New Jersey Agricultural Experiment Station (NJAES) launched the Jersey Tomato Project to revive the coveted Rutgers (Jersey) Tomato. Scientists had learned that Campbell Soup still had some genetic material from the parent plants of the original Rutgers tomato. From 2009 to 2014, scientists and plant breeders worked to revive the cultivar through inbreeding, and discovering a change in soil amendment that had removed sodium from the fertilizers used on the soil. [10] Dr. Josephy Heckman, a researcher in soil fertility at NJAES, also examined other key mineral deficiences in the soil that affect taste, including potassium and boron. [11]
After many experimental plantings, tastings, and adjustments in genetics, they finally debuted the Rutgers 250, named to celebrate the 250th anniversary of the university's founding in that same year. [12]
Organic farming, also known as ecological farming or biological farming, is an agricultural system that uses fertilizers of organic origin such as compost manure, green manure, and bone meal and places emphasis on techniques such as crop rotation and companion planting. It originated early in the 20th century in reaction to rapidly changing farming practices. Certified organic agriculture accounts for 70 million hectares globally, with over half of that total in Australia. Organic farming continues to be developed by various organizations today. Biological pest control, mixed cropping, and the fostering of insect predators are encouraged. Organic standards are designed to allow the use of naturally-occurring substances while prohibiting or strictly limiting synthetic substances. For instance, naturally-occurring pesticides such as pyrethrin are permitted, while synthetic fertilizers and pesticides are generally prohibited. Synthetic substances that are allowed include, for example, copper sulfate, elemental sulfur, and ivermectin. Genetically modified organisms, nanomaterials, human sewage sludge, plant growth regulators, hormones, and antibiotic use in livestock husbandry are prohibited. Organic farming advocates claim advantages in sustainability, openness, self-sufficiency, autonomy and independence, health, food security, and food safety.
Intensive agriculture, also known as intensive farming, conventional, or industrial agriculture, is a type of agriculture, both of crop plants and of animals, with higher levels of input and output per unit of agricultural land area. It is characterized by a low fallow ratio, higher use of inputs such as capital and labour, and higher crop yields per unit land area.
Subsistence agriculture occurs when farmers grow crops to meet the needs of themselves and their families on smallholdings. Subsistence agriculturalists target farm output for survival and for mostly local requirements, with little or no surplus. Planting decisions occur principally with an eye toward what the family will need during the coming year, and only secondarily toward market prices. Tony Waters, a professor of Sociology, defines "subsistence peasants" as "people who grow what they eat, build their own houses, and live without regularly making purchases in the marketplace".
Biodynamic agriculture is a form of alternative agriculture based on pseudo-scientific and esoteric concepts initially developed in 1924 by Rudolf Steiner (1861–1925). It was the first of the organic farming movements. It treats soil fertility, plant growth, and livestock care as ecologically interrelated tasks, emphasizing spiritual and mystical perspectives.
The history of agricultural science is a sub-field of the history of agriculture which looks at the scientific advancement of techniques and understanding of agriculture. Early study of organic production in botanical gardens was continued in with agricultural experiment stations in several countries.
The School of Environmental and Biological Sciences (SEBS) is a constituent school of Rutgers University's New Brunswick-Piscataway campus. Formerly known as Cook College—which was named for George Hammell Cook, a professor at Rutgers in the 19th Century—it was founded as the Rutgers Scientific School and later College of Agriculture after Rutgers was named New Jersey's land-grant college under the Morrill Act of 1862. Today, unlike the other arts and sciences schools at Rutgers, the School of Environmental and Biological Sciences specializes in environmental science, animal science and other life sciences. Although physically attached to the New Brunswick-Piscataway campus, most of the SEBS campus lies in North Brunswick, New Jersey.
Prunus maritima, the beach plum, is a species of plum native to the East Coast of the United States. It is a choice wild edible and its few pests and salt tolerance make it a resilient fruit crop for degraded lands and urban soils.
A corn maze or maize maze is a maze cut out of a corn field. Originally, the first full-size corn maze was believed to be created in Annville, Pennsylvania in 1993; however, similar corn mazes were highlighted in newspapers as early as 1982. Corn mazes have become popular tourist attractions in North America, and are a way for farms to generate tourist income. Many are based on artistic designs such as characters from movies. Corn mazes appear in many different designs. Some mazes are even created to tell stories or to portray a particular theme. Most have a path which goes all around the whole pattern, either to end in the middle or to come back out again, with various false trails diverging from the main path. In the United Kingdom, they are known as maize mazes, and are especially popular with farms in the east of England. These mazes are normally combined with other farm attractions of interest to families and day trippers. Some of these attractions include hay rides, a petting zoo, play areas for children, and picnic areas. Each year a few of the mazes are featured in national newspapers and TV. In the U.S., corn mazes typically are cut down circa the first week of November; in the UK typically in September after children return to school.
The tomato is the edible berry of the plant Solanum lycopersicum, commonly known as the tomato plant. The species originated in western South America, Mexico, and Central America. The Nahuatl word tomatl gave rise to the Spanish word tomate, from which the English word tomato derived. Its domestication and use as a cultivated food may have originated with the indigenous peoples of Mexico. The Aztecs used tomatoes in their cooking at the time of the Spanish conquest of the Aztec Empire, and after the Spanish encountered the tomato for the first time after their contact with the Aztecs, they brought the plant to Europe, in a widespread transfer of plants known as the Columbian exchange. From there, the tomato was introduced to other parts of the European-colonized world during the 16th century.
The New Jersey Agricultural Experiment Station is an entity currently operated by Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey in conjunction with the State of New Jersey in the university's role as the state's sole land-grant university. Today, it conducts research in agriculture, horticulture and turf grass science, and through the Rutgers Cooperative Extension aids New Jersey farmers, landscapers, and residents in each of the state's twenty-one counties.
Rutgers Day is a festival held on the last Saturday in April every year at Rutgers University, typically bringing tens of thousands of festival-goers onto campus. Open to the general public, it offers approximately 500 free programs that feature demonstrations, child-friendly interactive activities involving animals and plants, student performances, cultural traditions, food vendors, football scrimmage, and live music.
Campbell Soup Company, doing business as Campbell's, is an American company, most closely associated with its flagship canned soup products; however, through mergers and acquisitions, it has grown to become one of the largest processed food companies in the U.S. with a wide variety of products under its flagship Campbell's brand as well as other brands including Pepperidge Farm, Snyder's of Hanover, V8, and Swanson. Under its brands, Campbell's produces soups and other canned foods, baked goods, beverages, and snacks. It is headquartered in Camden, New Jersey.
Jacob Goodale Lipman was a professor of agricultural chemistry and researcher in the fields of soil chemistry and bacteriology.
Frankia alni is a Gram-positive species of actinomycete filamentous bacterium that lives in symbiosis with actinorhizal plants in the genus Alnus. It is a nitrogen-fixing bacterium and forms nodules on the roots of alder trees.
Natural farming, also referred to as "the Fukuoka Method", "the natural way of farming", or "do-nothing farming", is an ecological farming approach established by Masanobu Fukuoka (1913–2008). Fukuoka, a Japanese farmer and philosopher, introduced the term in his 1975 book The One-Straw Revolution. The title refers not to lack of effort, but to the avoidance of manufactured inputs and equipment. Natural farming is related to fertility farming, organic farming, sustainable agriculture, agroecology, agroforestry, ecoagriculture and permaculture, but should be distinguished from biodynamic agriculture.
The Black Krim is an heirloom tomato originating from Crimea. The plant is open-pollinated, indeterminate, bearing 8 ounce flattened globe fruits that are dark reddish-purple to black with green/brown shoulders.
The Celebrity tomato cultivar is a hybrid (biology) that produces long fruit-bearing stems holding 20 or more very plump, robust tomatoes. Fruits weigh approximately 8 oz., and are 4 inches across. Plants need caging or staking, and produce fruit throughout the growing season. The celebrity tomato is a cultivar of the species Solanum lycopersicum. It is a crossbreed of the common tomato that is widely used for various culinary purposes. This tomato is of great size and is known to be resistant to most tomato diseases such as Fusarium wilt, Verticillium wilt, Tobacco mosaic virus and Root-knot nematode due to its hybrid nature. Celebrity tomatoes are highly adaptive to harsh environments and can grow in a wide range of places including dry, humid and wet regions. They are resistant to cracking and splitting which usually occurs when there is an excess of water and sugar movement in the fruits. Therefore, causing the tomato skin to grow at a slower rate compared to the expansion of the fruit. They can survive in harsh uneven rainfall. However, they are highly susceptible to colder environments and are at a higher risk of dying in regions with short growing seasons. The plants can grow up to 5 feet in height with bright red medium-sized fruits. The plants are generally very thick and grow in clusters. The tomato fruits are mostly used in the making of various salsas, salads, juices and canned food.
The Jersey Boy tomato is a type of beefsteak tomato in the family Solanaceae, a hybrid cultivar of the Rutgers and the Brandywine tomatoes by Burpee Seeds. It made its first appearance as commercial seed registered 2014 and released circa 2015.
Robert Lyman Starkey was an American microbiologist. He was the president of the American Society for Microbiology in 1963.