With a staff of 22 faculty members, 63 academic and support staff members and 63 graduate students, programs in the department focus on a wide range of fields: cranberry production, vegetable crop production and breeding, floriculture, woody ornamental plants, and plant molecular biology. Approximately one-quarter of the faculty have formal extension appointments and some conduct outreach activities in their area of expertise. Over the years, close connections between department faculty and staff have built strong bridges in the horticultural community. Strong focus on molecular biology and plant breeding and genetics has been the emphasis in our department

Faculty in the Department of Horticulture have been successful in obtaining federal, state, and industrial grant funds in excess of $3,100,000 per year. These grant funds go toward supporting cutting-edge research and in supporting graduate students and laboratory personnel. Research conducted in the Department of Horticulture is communicated in the classroom, scientific journals, and presentations by faculty at national and international scientific meetings.

The research program of the department is intimately associated with the graduate instructional program. Most of the graduate degree candidates receive stipends from university administered funds. Students are expected to contribute to the research effort of a particular program. The planning, implementation, and publishing of research is as much a learning process as that found in formal classes. The inauguration of interdisciplinary plant breeding and plant genetics major as a separate program from horticulture have contributed to increases in graduate enrollment. Fourteen members of the departmental faculty are members of the Plant Breeding and Plant Genetics group who work actively on research and graduate student committees as well as teaching courses.

The objectives of the research program is to incorporate traditional and modern technologies in a comprehensive program for the next generation of plant breeders. Research areas within the department are:

• Crop Improvement through Breeding and Biotechnology
• Cultural Practice and Production Systems
• Soils and Crops Nutrition
• Weed Biology, Herbicide Physiology and Use
• Environmental Factors Affecting Plant Growth
• Environmental Stress
• Plant Physiology, Growth, and Development
• Biometry

Educational programs and services are channeled primarily through the Cooperative Extension agents in each county and include:

• County, regional and state educational short courses and meetings.
• Proceedings, newsletters, circulars, bulletins, fact sheets, news releases, radio, tv, video tapes, slide sets.
• Demonstrations and field plots.
• Educational visits and tours to individual farms, nurseries, greenhouses.
• In-service education for county extension personnel.
• Master gardener program.
• Individual correspondence and telephone calls.
• Involvement with horticulture industry trade organizations.

The Department of Horticulture at Wisconsin is one of the country’s premier plant science research departments. In 2002, programs in the department attracted more than $11,700,000* in industrial and competitive federal grants. (*A number of these gifts/grants span more than one year's funding.)