A Spray Chrysanthemum Cultivar for Cut Flower, ‘Perky Star’ , with Excellent Growth and Flowering Characteristics at High Temperature Period

Abstract

A new spray chrysanthemum (Dendranthema grandiflorum) cultivar ‘Perky Star’ was developed at Gyeonggi-do Agricultural Research and Extension Services, Korea, in 2016. Cultivar ‘Sei-Vista’, which has dark yellow colored flower and narrow and long ray floret, was crossed with ‘Amisa’, which has good flower shape, in 2012. This attempt was conducted to breed well-growing varieties at high temperatures period. The growth and flowering characteristics of the lines were investigated in retarding, shading and natural condition from 2014 to 2016, and a preference investigation was carried out in 2016, resulting in the GCS12-81-150 line being finally selected and named ‘Perky Star’. An application was made for a plant variety protection right for ‘Perky Star’ in 2017 (No. 2017-64), which was granted in 2018 (Korea Seed & Variety Service No. 7165). ‘Perky Star’ has single type flowers with yellow petals. This cultivar is suitable for export in summer season because it has good expression of the flower color and grows well at high temperatures and its petals are thick. In the autumn, spring, and summer cultures, the numbers of days to flowering under short day treatments were 49, 49 and 53 days, the plant heights were 88.3 cm, 84.2 cm, and 103.3 cm, the flower diameters were 5.1 cm, 4.8 cm, and 4.8 cm, and the numbers of flowers per stem were 25.0, 21.5, and 38.8, respectively. The cultivar ‘Perky Star’ was not fully resistant to white rust, showed the vase life of 21.3 days in autumn and got the preference degree of 4.2 in 5 points.