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Before 1950, producing Oklahoma wheat and peanut crops looked a little different from what it does now. Diseases, pests and yields were much more of a challenge for agricultural producers in the early 1900s, as farmers had few ways of obtaining new varieties with stronger genetics.<\/p>\n
\u201cI imagine wheat production would have been a game of \u2018whatever you can get your hands on,\u2019\u201d said\u00a0Brett Carver<\/a>, Oklahoma State University wheat genetics chair and head wheat breeder. \u201cThere were genetics available, but it was highly unregulated and unstructured, and there were a lot of unknowns.\u201d<\/p>\n Then,\u00a0Oklahoma Foundation Seed Stocks, Inc.<\/a>\u00a0was born. The non-profit organization, which is part of OSU, was incorporated in 1950 to serve as a bridge between OSU plant breeders and certified seed growers. The facility distributes certified seeds for mungbeans, oats, peanuts, rye, barley, bermudagrass and wheat to producers. In those early years, certified crops also included soybeans, potatoes, alfalfa, tomatoes, cotton, millet, okra, watermelon, sorghum and several species of grasses.<\/p>\n \u201cWith wheat as an example, we take a small number of seeds from our wheat breeders and increase that to larger quantities to provide to our seedsmen across the state. We\u2019re the state\u2019s parent seed division,\u201d said Jeff Wright, director of the Seed Stocks.<\/p>\n Seedsmen produce seeds for grain producers, and those producers grow and sell the grain from those seeds. There are four classifications of seeds: breeder seeds, foundation seeds, registered seeds and certified seeds.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re taking breeder seed and producing foundation seed from it, and we sell that foundation seed to seedsmen, and they produce registered seed,\u201d Wright said. \u201cThey can also take their registered seed and produce one more generation of seed called certified seed.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Certified seed is what the average Oklahoma farmer buys to produce grain.<\/p>\n \u201cResearch shows that planting certified seed is generally 3 to 5 bushels per acre better in yield, but it really comes down to knowing what you\u2019re planting,\u201d Wright said of the benefits of planting certified seed as opposed to producers saving their own seed.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cIf you\u2019re planting certified, you know you\u2019re getting weed-free seed and seed that has good germination. You\u2019re putting quality into the ground. As far as your end-use qualities, you are getting newer varieties that the end user has better use for, such as better baking and milling qualities.\u201d<\/p>\n Oklahoma Genetics, Inc.<\/a>\u00a0was founded in 2005 as a non-profit organization that would handle the licensing of OSU wheat varieties to protect the university\u2019s copyrights. The organization also works with producers across the state to grow large fields of experimental varieties.<\/p>\n Lasley Farms<\/a>, a peanut producer in Eakly, has partnered with Oklahoma Foundation Seed Stocks for nearly 70 of its 75 years, starting with George Lasley, whose two grandsons, David and Loyd, now run the business. The Lasley family produced the first foundation seed peanuts somewhere around 1956.<\/p>\n \u201cThey contacted three peanut farmers down here in Caddo County, and grandaddy was the only one who had irrigation and the only one who had made a crop that year,\u201d Loyd Lasley said. \u201cHe started growing and shelling peanuts for the foundation, and we are still doing it to this day.\u201d<\/p>\n David Lasley said the family\u2019s biggest goal and challenge with the partnership has always been maintaining the purity of the foundation seeds.<\/p>\n \u201cAs a teenager, I remember when we\u2019d have a cold front coming in and everyone was in high gear trying to get peanuts harvested, but we weren\u2019t able to do that because we had to vacuum every peanut out of a combine between varieties. Everyone else was blowin\u2019 and goin\u2019, and we were sitting there trying to blow every peanut out of every crack in that combine,\u201d David Lasley laughed.<\/p>\n David said now that their business sells peanut products for eating, maintaining purity in seeds is even more important to him.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cSome peanuts don\u2019t work as well as peanut candies or as roasted peanuts as others because they don\u2019t have the same taste, and when you are putting them out for consumers, you want them to be as pure as possible,\u201d David said.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ve always enjoyed working with the foundation seed,\u201d Loyd added. \u201cIt\u2019s always exciting to have new breeder seed and see how it\u2019s going to do.\u201d<\/p>\n And the feeling is mutual, according to Wright.<\/p>\n \u201cNowadays, with our contract growers, they are like extended family because we see them so much,\u201d Wright said. \u201cMany of them have been contracted growers for way longer than I\u2019ve been working here.\u201d<\/p>\n OSU Ag Research hosted a 75th anniversary celebration for the Foundation Seed Stocks on Friday at the facility in Stillwater, where the Lasley family was honored as a long-time partner, and OSU faculty and Oklahoma Secretary of Agriculture Blayne Arthur provided various updates on Oklahoma and OSU agriculture challenges, milestones and research.<\/p>\n \u201cOFSS has been a crucial part of our breeding program since its inception,\u201d said\u00a0Scott Senseman<\/a>, associate vice president of OSU Ag Research. \u201cThey have successfully bridged the gap between new variety development and getting those high-quality genetics to producers. That\u2019s something worth celebrating.\u201d<\/p>\n Carver may have put it best when describing the importance of this 75-year-old focal point for Oklahoma crop agriculture.<\/p>\n \u201cOklahoma Foundation Seed Stocks provides the launchpad for putting new OSU wheat varieties into orbit for adoption by the United States wheat industry. Without it, we are a grounded spaceship,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n