Articles
BREEDING RUELLIA AND TRIALING FOR STERILITY AT THE UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA©
Article number
1055_91
Pages
431 – 435
Language
English
Abstract
Ruellia is one of the largest genera in the Acanthaceae, consisting of approximately 250 species of perennial herbs, subshrubs, and shrubs, which are found mostly in tropical and subtropical areas.
There are many accepted synonyms for Ruellia simplex (R. brittoniana, R. coerulea, and R. tweediana) with the name R. simplex being the first documented, therefore having taxonomic priority. Ruellia simplex (Mexican petunia) is found in sunny areas on periodically inundated soils in Mexico, the Antilles, and southeastern South America (Ezcurra and Daniel, 2007). It was introduced to Florida sometime before 1940 (Hupp et al., 2009), and since then has become a very popular landscape plant in southern USA due to its high and continuous flowering and low maintenance requirements (Gilman, 1999). However, this introduced plant has escaped cultivation and become invasive in natural areas.
For several years, Purple Showers with tall habit and purple flowers was the only sterile commercial cultivar.
Since 2007, the breeding objective at University of Florida (UF) has been to develop sterile cultivars with different flower colors such as pink, white, white with a purple corolla tube, and potentially different growth habits, such as, tall, semi-dwarf, and dwarf.
Breeding approaches are ploidy manipulations and interspecific hybridizations.
There are many accepted synonyms for Ruellia simplex (R. brittoniana, R. coerulea, and R. tweediana) with the name R. simplex being the first documented, therefore having taxonomic priority. Ruellia simplex (Mexican petunia) is found in sunny areas on periodically inundated soils in Mexico, the Antilles, and southeastern South America (Ezcurra and Daniel, 2007). It was introduced to Florida sometime before 1940 (Hupp et al., 2009), and since then has become a very popular landscape plant in southern USA due to its high and continuous flowering and low maintenance requirements (Gilman, 1999). However, this introduced plant has escaped cultivation and become invasive in natural areas.
For several years, Purple Showers with tall habit and purple flowers was the only sterile commercial cultivar.
Since 2007, the breeding objective at University of Florida (UF) has been to develop sterile cultivars with different flower colors such as pink, white, white with a purple corolla tube, and potentially different growth habits, such as, tall, semi-dwarf, and dwarf.
Breeding approaches are ploidy manipulations and interspecific hybridizations.
Authors
R. Freyre, S.B. Wilson, G.W. Knox
Keywords
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