DOUGL8S-FIR
100
TREE PRQGENY TEST
OBJECT IVES AND ESTABL ISHMENT !I
By
Boyd c. Wilson
Forest Geneticist
Washington State Department of Natural Resources and
Roy R. Si Jen
Principal Plant Geneticist
U. S. Forest Service
Ha rch
28, 1970
The purpose of this paper is to Inform interested people that such a study is in existence. The initiation and progress of this study netrl in its 6th year is described.
The authors would I ike to express their appreciation to the Northwest
Christmas Tree Association for its interest and cooperation. It is for
Christmas tree grONers that this study was Initiated and only through the cooperation of the Association could SJch a study have been carried on successfully.
OBJECTIVES
Good quality Douglas-fir Christmas trees have always been at a pre­ mium. The natural variation present in this species makes it necessary to apply cultural practices such as shearing a11d pruning to get the qua I ity and uniformity of trees desired. Even then, individual trees respond differently to these practices. Some, when she;ired, respond by filling in completely with side branches while others do not. Some trees require heavy shearing, others pract lcally none.
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This Information was prepared for distribution at the Christmas Tree
GrONers' Short Course, March
28, 1970, at the Alderbrook Inn, Union,
Washington. Washington State Department of Natural Resources, Forest
Land Management Division Contribution No.
124.

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The ideal Christmas tree would be one that would assume perfect form, color, density, etc. without cultural treatment. The trees resulting from present sources of seed are quite variable. If a source of seed could be found. that would consistently produce trees of good form with a minimum of cultural treatment, the cost of gr""1ing Christmas trees would be greatly reduced and the qua I i ty increased.
In May,
1964, it was suggested that a way of quickly producing better
Christmas tree seed might be to progeny test a number of open-pollinated trees and use seed from the best trees for further Christmas tree planting.
This plan was initiated by the Department of Natural Resources and the U. s.
Forest Service in the fal I of
1964.
The U. s. F. S. selected seed from
60
Dougl<!s-fir trees in the Corvallis, Oregon areil and the DNR collected seed from
61 trees in the Shelton, Washington area. The aim was to select
Douglas-fir parent trees completely at random. The scientific evidence that good Christmas tree parents could be selected at ages
25 to
50 based on their physical characteristics was very weak. In addition, if only carefully selected trees were included in this study, a measure of the existing population would not be available and there would be no idea of h""1 much gain could be made using this tree improvement method.
NURSERY
The seed from the selective open-pollinated parents were S""1n in the spring,
1965.
The Washington selections were gr""1n at the Webster Nursery, and the Corvallis selections at the Forestry Sciences Laboratory on the
Oregon State University campus in Corvallis.
FIELD TESTING
In the fall of
1966, the seedlings were two years old and ready for field planting. The Northwest Christmas Tree Association agreed to help with the field planting. Eight members of the association, five In Oregon

-3and three in Washington, agreed to establish and care for a field plantation on their· lands. Some nursery losses had occurred, but
50 fami 1 ies from each state were field planted in three replications at each of the eight locations. The size of the field plantation was approximately
90 feet by
250 feet. In each of the repl I cations, there was one family represented by a rat1 of three trees. Therefore, each grower had nine trees of each family in his plantation or a total of
900 trees.
The grat1e r agreed to ca re for the plantat I on, in 1 ud i ng shearing, pruning and measurement of the trees, The ground on each plantation was to be bare and Atrazine was applied to nearly all plantations in the spring of the first grat1lng season.
Boyd Wi 1 son and Roy S'i len agreed to supply the trees for this study, properly identified and ready for planting, and to supply the planting design. Their responsibilities also were to analyze the data which resulted from this study and make the results available to all members of the Nortl'Mest Christmas Tree Association.
The brief diagram of the study is shO'/n on the attached page,
RESULTS
The trees a re only
5 yea rs old at the present time and have been sheared for the first time during the spring of
1970.
It is, therefore, difficult to say positively which families are going to produce the best
Christmas trees.
It is very evident, hat1ever, that tremendous differences exist between families. Some families are consistently good from plantation to plantation.
Others are consistently poor. On the other han , some fami 1 ies are out­ standing in one location yet do very poorly on another plantation.

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It is also very evident that the quality of the Christmas trees have
I ittle relation to the appearance of the parent tree. Indications are that some of the best Christmas trees have been produced by some of the most unlikely looking parents. At the present time, it appears that the best way to evaluate a good Christmas tree parent is to grow seedlings from that parent.

DOUGLAS-FIR
100
TREE PROGENY TEST
CONES
SELECT PARENT TREES
FIELD PLANTATIONS
3
In Washington
5
In Oregon
Each plantation contains three replications. Each replication co tains a rCA-1 of three trees from each family. There a re
50 families fro,m Washing• ton and
50 families from
Oregon.
REPLICATIONS
11 111
300
TREES
300
REES
300
REES
Based on field performance of families, more seed will be collected from the best parents.