Located in Yuanyang County, Xinxiang City, Henan Province, Yuanyang Long-term Experimental Base of No-timber Forest R&D Center of Chinese Academy of Forestry (Paulownia R&D Center of the State Forestry and Grassland Administration) covers a total area of some 800 mu. The base focuses on collection, preservation, evaluation, directional breeding, and propagation of non-timber forest tree species and Paulownia germplasm resources.
The base is well-equipped with a 820 m2 laboratory, a 500m2 auxiliary rooms for scientific use, a 1075 m2 intelligent greenhouse, and a 1888 m2 ordinary nursery stock breeding greenhouse. It can afford the demand of breeding 1 million seedlings annually. It is also equipped with roads, electric power supplies, irrigation systems, security walls and full coverage monitoring system, as well as an intelligent weather station.
At present, it preserves more than 4,300 copies of non-timber forest and Paulownia germplasm resources, including over 1,800 of Eucommia resources, 819 of apricots for kernel use, 733 of diospyros, 414 of almonds, more than 400 copies of Paulownia, and 206 of Prunus. Aiming at various breeding goals, the base preserves more than 700 copies (including Mengzhou base, the same below) of Eucommia ulmoides, kernel apricot, persimmon, almonds, paulownia fine clones, excellent germplasm and special germplasm, and other breeding groups. There are 61 of them has been identified as improved varieties, 14 of them were issued as national level caltivars.
