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Collards

Making It Grow Radio Minute
SC Public Radio

Hello, I’m Amanda McNulty with Clemson Extension and Making It Grow. At the Coastal Research and Development Center 2023 brassica field day we saw a field with several hundred different collard green plants growing in it. There’re two major types of collards, one is cabbage-like plants that have a head with leaves surrounding them. The other non-heading type which is what most of us are familiar with, has a stalk that grows upright with new leaves being produced as the plant gets larger. Two plant scientists, Powell Smith and Mark Fortnum, of Clemson Extension and the U S D A, respectively, were worried about the lack of genetic collard material available for breeding programs if new problems developed. They got a grant to travel through the so called collard belt, spotting small fields and gardens with fields with types of collards growing in them.

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Amanda McNulty is a Clemson University Extension Horticulture agent and the host of South Carolina ETV’s Making It Grow! gardening program. She studied horticulture at Clemson University as a non-traditional student. “I’m so fortunate that my early attempts at getting a degree got side tracked as I’m a lot better at getting dirty in the garden than practicing diplomacy!” McNulty also studied at South Carolina State University and earned a graduate degree in teaching there.