GENERAL COMBINING ABILITY OF SELECTED BLACKCURRANT (RIBES NIGRUM L.) GENOTYPES IN BREEDING FOR DESSERT QUALITY FRUIT

General combining ability (GCA) of six blackcurrant genotypes – Ribes nigrum L. (‘Bona’, ‘Ben Sarek’, ‘Lentaj’, ‘Storklas’, ‘SCRI C2/15/40’, and ‘Czereszniewa’) was evaluated for usefulness in the breeding of new cultivars with high quality desert fruits.
Genotypes differed morphologically, commercially, and probably genetically, however, they each produced large fruits.
They were crossed in a half-diallel cross design.
Seedlings representing 15 full-sib families were tested in a randomized complete block design with four replicates (12 plants per plot). The experiment was established at the Experimental Orchard of the Research Institute of Pomology and Floriculture in Skierniewice (RIPF), Central Poland in 1997. Individual seedlings were observed over 2000–2003 for the following traits: fruit yield, size of fruits, and field resistance of plants to main fungal diseases (powdery mildew, leaf spot, and white pine blister rust). The most promising parent for a blackcurrant breeding program with an objective of developing “dessert type” cultivars in Polish conditions was the clone ‘SCRI C2/15/40’ and also the cultivar ‘Storklas’.

IX International Rubus and Ribes Symposium

S. Pluta, W. Mądry, E. Żurawicz

blackcurrant, GCA, diallel cross, yield, fruit size

https://doi.org/10.17660/ActaHortic.2008.777.4