Identification of superior parents for potato breeding programmes of new cultivars for processing.

Leszek Domański

Plant Breeding and Acclimatization Institute, Department of Potato Genetics and Parental Lines, 05-831 Młochów, Poland (Poland)

Ewa Zimnoch-Guzowska

Plant Breeding and Acclimatization Institute, Department of Potato Genetics and Parental Lines, 05-831 Młochów, Poland (Poland)

Maria Domańska

Plant Breeding and Acclimatization Institute, Department of Potato Genetics and Parental Lines, 05-831 Młochów, Poland (Poland)

Abstract

Abstract Combining ability of 27 potato parents was evaluated in three factorial cross experiments (North Carolina II design) at Młochów Research Center of Plant Breeding and Acclimatization Institute (IHAR). The pool of tested forms comprised 18 cultivars and 9 parental lines. Depending on the experiment 60 or 90 unselected individuals per each family were evaluated. Completely randomised block design was applied for the purposes of each experiment. Progenies were evaluated for 7 traits. Important from the point of view of processing quality traits: fry colour, percentage of defect-free chips, tuber shape and the incidence of secondary growth seem to be determined by both additive and non-additive action of genes. However, in the case of fry colour the proportion of general combining ability were considerably higher than that for specific combining ability. There were identified five valuable parents for breeding of cultivars suitable for chip processing (Atlantic, Brodick, Panda, Signal, M-62633), and two parents (Agria, Shepody) for breeding of cultivars for French fries processing.

Keywords:

fry colour, combining ability, parental choice, potato, tuber quality traits