Breeding of Fruit and Plantation Crops 2 + 1

PEACH

Breeding objectives

• The main objective of peach (Prunus persica) improvement for low chilling areas would be to develop cultivars with low chilling requirement, tolerance to high summer temperature, maturity between 60 and 70 days after full bloom, firm flesh, freedom from loose fibre, attractive colour, non- browning of flesh, resistance to root-knot nematode, iron chlorosis and water logging. For processing peaches, firmness of flesh, freedom from loose fibre, attractive colour and non-browning of flesh are the important characters to be improved.

Introduction and selection

• A large number of low chilling peach varieties, e.g. Florida sun, Sun Red and Sun Gold and some other selections, Floridared and Floradabelle were introduced at the PAU, Ludhiana, during late sixties from Florida and California states in USA. Of these introductions, Florida sun, Florida red, Sun Red and 16-33 (named-I-Shan– Punjab) became very popular. Of the later introductions from USA, TA 170, known as ‘Partap’, has been identified as early (7 days earlier than Florda sun). Its flesh is yellow, firm, with red coloration and better keeping quality. Another two introductions from Florida, Florda price and Earli grande, have been recommended for commercial cultivation for the plains of Punjab and adjoining areas. Florda price is early ripening, whereas Earli grande is an mid-season variety.

Clonal selection

• ‘Sharbati’ is a chance seedling selected at Saharanpur

Hybridization

• Redhar is a cross between “Halehaven and Kalhaven bred at USA. Inter-specific hybridization has also been attempted in peaches especially in the development of rootstock resistant to nematodes. Nemagcrad, a hybrid between P.persica x P. davididasa is a widely used root-knot nematode resistant rootstock, which is immune to Meloidogyne incognita.Planned hybridization work on peach was started in 1957 at Saharanpur. Peach Saharanpur Prabhat (Sharbati x Flordasun) was released. Fruits of this variety are attractive, sweet, maturing at least 4 days earlier than Flordasun.