Nearly every gardener knows that one of the best strategies in choosing plants is to consult the USDA Plant Hardiness Zone Map, which identifies plants based on how tolerant the plant shoots are to cold temperatures. But plant roots are another story, and they often are less tolerant of sub-freezing temperatures than the shoots of the same plant. For businesses that grow nursery stock in containers, protecting container-grown plants during winter leads to increased labor costs and can cause high losses due to physical damage.

The Granite State continues to depend on migration for most of its population growth, and the state is becoming more racially diverse, according to new research from the New Hampshire Agricultural Experiment Station and the Carsey School of Public Policy at the University of New Hampshire.

The University of New Hampshire announces the official launch of and participation in the National Land-Grant Impacts website, a centralized online resource that highlights the teaching, agricultural experiment station research, and cooperative extension efforts by land-grant universities.

J. Brent Loy, professor emeritus of plant biology and genetics, and a researcher with the NH Agricultural Experiment Station, was honored at a special twilight celebration Tuesday, Oct. 3, 2017, recognizing his 50 years of research and innovation at the University of New Hampshire.

Serita Frey, professor of soil microbial ecology at the University of New Hampshire and a researcher with the New Hampshire Agricultural Experiment Station, has been named one of the most highly cited researchers in the world, a prestigious distinction earned by fewer than 0.1 percent of scientists globally.

J. Brent Loy’s cucurbit breeding program at the University of New Hampshire, largely funded by the NHAES, represents the longest continuous squash and pumpkin breeding program in North America. The 54 varieties of melons, squash, gourds and ornamental pumpkin released by UNH during the past 15 years have had a major impact on agriculture in the Northeast. In 2014, the wholesale value of cucurbit seed marketed from varieties with UNH parentage was more than $2 million. The value of farm produce derived from those varieties would be several fold that of seed sales.

University of New Hampshire scientists have conducted the first study of oyster farming-nitrogen dynamics in New Hampshire, providing the first solid research on the state’s oyster farming industry and the role oyster farms play with nitrogen removal. The research, which was funded in part by the NH Agricultural Experiment Station, contributes to a growing body of research on how oysters affect the nitrogen content of estuaries such as Great Bay.

New Hampshire growers interested in adding spinach to their winter crop production soon will have additional information to help them select which varieties to grow and when to plant, thanks to a research project underway at the NH Agricultural Experiment Station’s Woodman Horticultural Research Farm.

Organic dairy cows fed kelp meal produced less methane for part of the summer grazing season, according to researchers with the New Hampshire Agricultural Experiment Station at the University of New Hampshire. Based on these initial and other promising results, scientists will expand their studies to look at how kelp and other seaweeds impact animal health and methane emissions of organic dairy cows in New England.

J. Brent Loy, professor emeritus of plant biology and genetics, and a researcher with the NH Agricultural Experiment Station (NHAES), has been awarded the 2015 Vegetable Breeding Working Group Award of Excellence by the American Society of Horticultural Science.

Presented since 1992, the award recognizes breeding programs that have had a significant impact on the vegetable industry within the past 20 years by providing salient basic information and/or cultivar or germplasm releases.