Alaska Agricultural and Forestry Experiment Station

rdf:langString Alaska Agricultural and Forestry Experiment Station

rdf:langString The Alaska Agricultural and Forestry Experiment Station (AFES) was established in 1898 in Sitka, Alaska, also the site of the first agricultural experiment farm in what was then Alaska Territory. Today the station is administered by the University of Alaska Fairbanks through the School of Natural Resources and Agricultural Sciences. Facilities and programs include the Fairbanks Experiment Farm (est. 1906), the Georgeson Botanical Garden, the Palmer Research and Extension Center, the Matanuska Experiment Farm, and the Reindeer Research Program. Research at AFES has concentrated on introducing vegetable cultivars appropriate to Alaska and developing adapted cultivars of grains, grasses, potatoes, and berries (for example, strawberries and raspberries). Animal and poultry management was also important in early research, with studies on sheep, yaks, cattle, dairy cows, and swine over the years. Modern animal husbandry study at AFES is focused on reindeer and muskoxen, with some research on fisheries. Other research is in soils (cryosols and carbon cycling studies, for example) and climate change, revegetation, forest ecology and management, and rural and economic development, including energy and biomass research.