August 2022 - 9

In those meetings, he often plays guitar
instrumentals inspired by blackberries
and winegrapes. He wrote " Blackberry
Freedom, " " Blackberry Traveler " and
" Blackberry Horizon " while walking his
dog. He performs the songs on YouTube,
with the UA blackberry patches as a
backdrop (tinyurl.com/mrm69uf7).
In May, Clark advised Florida
growers considering blackberries at
that state's first blackberry field day. He
also addressed a University of Georgia
breeding conference as well as meetings
in New Orleans, Michigan and Chicago.
Clark recently spent a month
evaluating seedlings during Arkansas'
short blackberry season, which runs
June into early July. It involved long
days of tasting berries, walking with feet
and pants wet from the morning dew,
battling bugs and visiting cooperators in
six miles of plantings.
Clark inherited Arkansas' fruit
breeding program from James Moore,
who died in 2017. In 1964, Moore
returned to Arkansas and started the
program after working in fruit breeding
for the U.S. Department of Agriculture
in Beltsville, Maryland. The transition to
Worthington, who came to UA in 2016,
is expected in December.
" She is really talented, very
enthusiastic and is an accomplished
scientist, " Clark said. " The most
important thing about our program is
there are no shortcomings. It has been
a tremendous model, the best I've ever
seen in a university environment when
someone takes the place of someone,
as universities usually have gaps and all
sorts of things happen that can create
discontinuity.
" Dr. Worthington leads a major part
of the fruit breeding effort here, and she
will have all the duties when I complete
my last year, " Clark said. " She is the
future, in other words, of fruit breeding
here. "
Clark views the future optimistically.
" There's something special about
Arkansas, " he said.
Scientific recognition
At the July 30-Aug. 3 American
Society for Horticultural Science annual
conference in Chicago, the American
Pomological Society (APS) awarded
Clark the 2022 Chad Finn Ambassador
Award. Through the award, APS
recognizes individuals who have made
significant contributions to pomology,
the study of fruit and its cultivation,
particularly in outreach and service.
Clark is the award's second recipient.
It is named for Finn, a research geneticist
and small fruit breeder who worked
at the U.S. Department of Agriculture
Horticultural Research Crop Unit in
Corvallis, Oregon, from 1993 until his
2019 death.
Nominating Clark was like
recommending Michael Jordan for the
NBA Hall of Fame, said David Karp,
assistant specialist in the University of
California-Riverside's department of
botany and plant sciences.
" Many, perhaps most fruit breeders,
work their whole lives without producing
any varieties that truly make a difference, "
he said in his nomination letter.
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" Cultivars that really change the
game for a fruit or nut are few and
far between. Dr. Clark has been so
alert, skilled, and fortunate that he has
truly revolutionized two major crops:
grapes and blackberries. "
Although primarily a fruit breeder
and researcher, Clark is a popular
speaker and presenter on fruit
breeding because of requests for
information on the varieties he and his
colleagues developed.
" This is a fabulous honor because it
honors my close personal friend Chad
Finn, " Clark said in a news release.
" We spent over 30 years working and
having fun together in fruit breeding.
It's a joy to be associated with his
name. " FGN
Muscadine grapes on breeding vines at the UA Clarksville, Arkansas, Fruit Research
Station. Crossing muscadine grapes is a major initiative of UA's fruit breeding program.
FGN | AUGUST 2022 | 9

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August 2022

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of August 2022