TEN YEARS OF OLIVE BREEDING IN CÓRDOBA (SPAIN)

Most olive cultivars have been produced by empirical selection made by growers and are known to be several centuries old.
The long juvenile period of olive seedlings has hampered the release of new cultivars by systematic breeding.
In fact, it has been reported that it takes at least 10 years for olive seedlings to reach the adult phase and the flowering stage.
In 1992, an olive breeding programme started in Córdoba (Spain) aimed at superseding the existing cultivars grown in this area.
The agronomic traits considered for selection are: earliness of bearing, productivity, oil production efficiency, oleic acid content, resistance to Spilocaea oleagina (Cast.) Huges and suitability to mechanical harvesting.
Parents are chosen for having good performance in one or more of these characteristics.
Seeds are germinated in damp perlite at 14°C and seedling growth is forced in the greenhouse with continuous light, fertirrigation and adequate pruning.
This has made it possible to get olive seedlings on average more than 1.6 m high in 9-10 months from seed germination.
Seedlings with this height are transplanted to the field where the canopy is formed at 1.6 m height in order to rapidly overcome the juvenile period.
With this protocol it has been possible to reduce the juvenile phase in olive seedlings to 28 months from seed germination.
Once in the open field, seedlings are evaluated for agronomic traits during the first three bearing years and then the best genotypes are selected.
Currently, 15 selected genotypes are compared with two main Spanish cultivars (‘Picual’ and ‘Arbequina’) and the main Italian cultivar (‘Frantoio’) in a randomised complete block design with eight replicates under both irrigation and dry farming.

XI Eucarpia Symposium on Fruit Breeding and Genetics

L. León, R. de la Rosa, D. Barranco, L. Rallo

seed germination, juvenility, seedlings, cultivars, selections

https://doi.org/10.17660/ActaHortic.2004.663.135