Brief results and prospects of apple breeding at VNIISPK

Abstract

As a result of 65 years of intensive large-scale apple breeding work, the Russian Research Institute of Fruit Crop Breeding (VNIISPK) created and included in the State Register of Breeding Achievements 56 apple cultivars of different fruit ripening periods. Some of them are already widely known and occupy large areas in industrial and amateur gardens. Among these cultivars, Venyaminovskoye, Veteran, Rozhdestvenskoye and Sinap Orlovsky are approved for use in four regions of the Russian Federation; Kandil Orlovsky, Kulikovskoye, Orlik and Orlovskoye Polosatoye are grown in three regions; 10 cultivars are zoned in two regions of Russia; the remaining 37 cultivars are allowed for use so far in one region of the country. For the first time in Russia and in the world, 17 triploid apple cultivars were created from intervalent crosses. These cultivars are characterized by more regular fruiting and more beautiful and larger fruits. Some of them are immune to scab. In total, more than 20 apple cultivars immune to scab have been created, including the first domestic scab-immune cultivar Imrus (immune russian). The long-term work has shown that only a large interdisciplinary team can create apple cultivars that meet the ever-increasing production requirements. The disadvantage in our breeding work with apples, as well as in other breeding institutions, is that it usually takes too much time to create a cultivar (often more than 25 years). As our experience shows, it took no more than 20 years to create individual cultivars: Rozhdestvenskoye – 16 years, Priokskoye – 18 years, Imrus and Poesia – 19 years, to create Alexandr Boyko, Venyaminovskoye, Kandil Orlovsky, Maslovskoye, Solnyshko, Stroevskoye, and Pamyaty Khitrovo it took 20 years. The greatest number of years was spent on the creation of the following cultivars: Pepin Orlovsky – 48 years, Orlovskaya Zarya – 45 years, Pamyat Voinu and Radost Nadezhdy – 38 years, Kulikovskoye – 37 years, Sinap Orlovsky – 34 years, Den Pobedy – 33 years. This article presents techniques that accelerate the selection process in apples. In the coming years, the goal is to obtain triploid cultivars that are immune to scab and have columnar habit (“three in one”).