Breeding of Vegetable, Spice and Tuber Crops

Coriander

Coriander: Coriandrum sativum
Family: Apiaceae

• Cultivated types of Indian coriander can be divided into two more or less distinct classes on basis of seed size- small and bold seeded. Small seeded types are highly aromatic and fetch better price. English, German and Russian varieties are of this type. Besides, they are hard to break, which reduces breakage during handling, transport and storage. Small seeded types are normally cultivated in irrigated areas. Bold seeded types are usually less aromatic and fetch comparatively low price. These types are cultivated in unirrigated areas. There is another classification based on part used viz. seed purpose varieties and dual purpose varieties. It is a cross pollinated diploid species with 2n = 22 chromosomes.

Breeding objectives

• High yielding varieties with disease resistance
• Varieties with high essential oil content
• Varieties adaptable for different agro – climatic regions.
• Large variability exists in the yield and the yield contributing characters in coriander. The characters such as days to flowering, days to maturity and number of secondary branches are to be taken into account while selecting parents for hybridization. The methods of breeding that can be attempted are selection, hybridization and mutation breeding