Putting Genetics to Work
It is difficult now to imagine doing my job without having access to Gemview.
"Gemview arose out of necessity. Sue and I were managing a large clonal selection and plant production program of radiata pine in New Zealand and Australia with only the help of a part time technician. Handling the demands of an increasing resource of clonal trials was becoming very daunting. When we began funding the business ourselves, it became even more critical to have a database tailored to perennial plant breeding which was more flexible and user friendly than other options available.
To solve these problems, we commissioned the development of Gemview. Gemview has allowed Forest Genetics to make better use of its resource of over 180 clonal evaluation trials and pedigrees involving over 14,000 genotypes, while also saving the business the cost of additional technical assistance that would otherwise have been needed. The reality is that we can ask questions of our data that we wouldn’t have been able to do without Gemview.
Gemview has made identification and selection of the top 1% of clonal varieties that express superior gains in growth rate, tree form, wood quality and disease resistance much more efficient and cost effective. It has substantially increased the efficiency of the selection and breeding process, as well as validation and deployment into plantation forests to maximise genetic gain for our forest growing clients.
Gemview has enabled Forest Genetics to operate its clonal forestry business very efficiently with a very small staff, and to achieve success in developing and deploying high-quality clonal varieties using much reduced financial resources when compared with similar programs."
This is a dramatic instance of a Forest Genetics production variety (right) next to control pines (left). Gemview has helped Forest Genetics to achieve some remarkable genetic gains at a fraction of the cost of similar programs.