Compatibility of interspecific hybridization between tulip cultivars and wild species native to China

Interspecific hybridization is an important means of breeding new cultivars with novel characteristics introduced from their parents.
The interspecific hybridization was carried out between five tulip cultivars ‘Heart of Poland’, ‘Golden Parade’, ‘Purple Dream’, ‘Crystal Star’, ‘Bolroyal Dream’ and wild specie Tulipa altaica. In five combinations, the compatibility was observed including pollen germinability, stigma receptivity, fruit-setting, hybrid seed germination and bulblet formation in this paper.
The results showed that T. altaica has the highest germination rate (69.58%) compared with any other parents.
The highest stigmatic receptivity of five female cultivars was recorded on 10:00 am one day after flowering.
The crosses of ‘Heart of Poland’ × T. altaica and ‘Bolroyal Dream’ × T. altaica displayed a higher percentage of fruit setting with 79.32 and 82.23%, respectively.
A total of 698 hybrid seeds were obtained from interspecific hybridization combinations, including ‘Heart of Poland’ × T. altaica, ‘Purple dream’ × T. altaica and ‘Bolroyal Dream’ × T. altaica. In contrast, other two crosses were completely unsuccessful when ‘Golden Parade’ and ‘Crystal Star’ were used as female parents.
The higher rates of seed germination and bulblet formation were recorded in two crosses with 63.45 and 55.63% in ‘Heart of Poland’ × T. altaica, 58.35 and 61.88% in ‘Bolroyal Dream’ × T. altaica. The results of this paper could provide some useful information about the interspecific cross between T. altaica and tulip cultivars.

XXXI International Horticultural Congress (IHC2022): International Symposium on Innovations in Ornamentals: from Breeding to Market

G.M. Xing, H.H. Zhang, Y.Q. Zhang, J.J. Lu, T.Y. Wu, Z.Z. Tian, L.W. Qu

Tulipa spp., interspecific hybridization, pollen germinability, stigma receptivity

https://doi.org/10.17660/ActaHortic.2023.1368.37