Self-blanching celery bred for improved quality

Abstract

Selection among the progeny of crosses between self-blanching and green varieties of celery has given high yielding, early maturing, self-blanching lines which are less stringy and of better flavour than existing early maturing self-blanching varieties. The crosses were made by using blow-flies to pollinate pairs of non-emasculated self-blanching and green plants enclosed in pollen proof bags. In the progenies from seed harvested only from the self-blanching parents in such crosses, the hybrid seedlings could be distinguished from the non-hybrids by their green colour. Since the self-blanching character was determined by a single recessive gene in the homozygous condition, it was possible to recover true breeding self-blanching plants in the F2 generation. From the F2 generation onwards, all selection for quality characters was made only on self-blanching plants.

Trials have shown that in addition to the improvement in quality, two F4 lines derived from such material gave yields which were somewhat greater than those of the control varieties and had satisfactory blanching. More extensive trials are in progress to determine whether the lines show consistently superior quality, and whether they have sufficient merit to warrant their release as new varieties.