After stints at UCD and Cornell, I’ve been a plant breeder for over 40 years, the first three decades of which focused on forage crops. In 2012 my tomato breeding hobby morphed into a more serious exercise and soon thereafter I transitioned into my current full-time tomato breeding career. Frogsleap Farm was the name of our small farm in southern Minnesota, and I adopted that name for our tomato breeding company. About that same time Aaron Whaley and I formed a partnership to couple my breeding ambitions with his knowledge and access to the U.S. vegetable seed market, tomato seed production partners, and his willingness to host our various breeding nurseries and related greenhouse activities. A.P Whaley and FLF Tomato are joint owners of the brand “Cream of the Crop Tomatoes”. Our goal has always been to combine the flavor of the best heirloom types with the improved disease resistance, fruit quality and productivity of modern hybrids. Thanks to the excellent multiple pest resistant lines/hybrids developed by Randy Gardner at NCSU, and the more recent lines developed by Martha Mutschler-Chu at Cornell – we’ve had great access to multiple pest resistance genes and their associated molecular markers. These have been used in a 2-3 generation/year MAS program to develop parent lines with exceptional fruit flavor/quality and state-of-the-art multiple pest resistance. To date four or our Cream of the Crop hybrids have earned All America Selection awards.We are breeding for fresh market types, adapted to either open-field or protected culture cultivation. Our program focuses on larger fruited .and cherry types with various fruit color combinations. We currently have breeding nurseries/trials in Wisconsin, Minnesota, Pennsylvania and North Carolina.
Listed skills include Plant Breeding and Germplasm Licensing.
