UMaine potato breed edges out longtime favorites [Video]

“It’s been more than 100 years since herds of woodland caribou graced the state of Maine. At least we can still claim the potato.”

Thus opens the description in this year’s Fedco seed catalog of the Caribou Russet, an oblong, reddish-brown potato with white flesh that the Clinton-based gardening cooperative hails for the vegetable’s reported versatility in the kitchen (“great mashed, fried, or baked”), productivity in the fields and resistance to common diseases like hollow heart and verticillium wilt.

Just nine years after it was introduced, the Caribou Russet, developed by the University of Maine, has overtaken the state’s potato market, edging out breeds that dominated the market for over a century.

“It’s one of the most significant varieties in the last 20 years,” said Jim Gerritsen, former owner of Wood Prairie Farm in Bridgewater, which sells organic seed potatoes throughout the U.S. Caribou Russets account for about 10% of …