Breeding of Fruit and Plantation Crops

Grapes

• Botanical name: Vitis vinifera L.
• Family: Vitaceae
• Chromosome number: 2n=2x=38.

Centre of diversity

• European grape (Vitis vinifera L.) is considered to have originated primarily between Caspian and Black sea region (Vavilov, 1951). American grapes belonging to a large number Euvitis and Muscadinia species have originated in North America, referred to as ‘Vine land’ by Zielinski (1955).
 
Germplasm resources

• Field gene banks of grapes are maintained at Division of Fruits and Horticultural Technology, IARI, New Delhi, Indian Institute of Horticulture Research, Bangalore, Ganesh Khind Botanical Garden, Pune etc. Further, 616 genotypes of grapes are maintained at IIHR, Bangalore
 
Objectives
Objectives of breeding for grapes are:

• To develop early maturing, seedless and sweet cultivars for table purpose.
• To induce resistance to anthracnose, Phylloxera and chaffer beetle.
• To develop varieties with medium vigour and productive basal bud, which can be trained on head or pandal system of training
• For the tropics the objectives of breeding should be:
• To develop high yielding and high quality varieties with increased fruitfulness of basal buds, less degree of apical dominance, suitability for different purpose such as table, raisin, wine and juice and resistance to diseases.
• To develop root stocks resistant to salinity, nematodes and drought