James Hutton Kidd
James Hutton Kidd ( born September 12, 1877 in Hexham, Northumberland, † 1945) was a New Zealand fruit growers. He became famous for the apples, which he bred. These included the varieties Kidds Orange Red, Freyberg and especially Gala.
Kidd was born as a child of the tailor James Hutton Kidd and his wife Harriett Alice Lee in England. The family moved to Kidd's childhood to Christchurch in New Zealand. In New Zealand, Kidd graduated from an agricultural training before he decided to go into fruit.
In the countryside of Wanganui, he ran his first orchard along with his brother Wilfried. According to tradition, due to poor health, he decided in 1906 to relocate its operation according to Greytown in South Wairarapa District near Wellington. Kidd worked here on a site, which comprised 20 acres.
Kidd was interested early on in scientific research for fruit production. He experimented on his own grounds with different cultivation methods, supported the research against apple diseases and advocated for the establishment of a Department of Plant Diseases at the New Zealand Department of Scientific and Industrial Research.
Of special importance was Kidd but as a breeder. He tried American varieties, which he valued for their looks to cross with more aromatic British varieties under controlled conditions. He scored his first success in 1912 with a crossing of Cox Orange with Delicious. The apple he baptized Delco. After he had planted the apple several decades on its own grounds and brought from there into the trade, he sold the rights in the 1930s to the dealer Duncan and Davies, who drove him around the world as Kidd's Orange Red.
Until his death in 1945 Kidd undertook many years further crossing experiments, while experimenting in particular with Golden Delicious. After his death in 200 two -year-old trees came to the Institute for Plant Breeding Research, Department of Scientific and Industrial Research in New Zealand that Kidd had recovered from his breeding experiments that the resulting teased at the Appleby Research Orchard near Nelson, the resulting apples and investigated. While many of the resulting apples showed an excessive russets, to be commercially traded, developed two varieties, Telstar and Freyberg to lovers places.
The variety D8 showed the greatest commercial potential and was sent for further tests to North Havelock. There she sat down in a test against 900 other apple varieties from all over the world through. The cultivated variety of Kidd came as a gala in the trade, is distributed worldwide today, and especially in Europe are often the most popular apple in general. Gala itself served as a parent places for diverse commercially successful apples that came in the trade since 2000.
Kidd was married since 1916 with Laura ( Lola ) Gilbert. He was involved both in local politics as well as in various associations such as the New Zealand Farmers' Union. In 1970 institutionalized the New Zealand Association Fruitgrowers the Kidd Memorial Award Scheme to support further breeding research. In Greytown even the Stella Bull Park is reminiscent of Kidd. In the park a number of old fruit varieties are planted, including Kidd's Orange Red Kidd's apple orchard was in 2013 during operation.