Comparison of pollen quality in Vitis vinifera L. cultivars

Abstract

Abstract Pollen quality of 15 cultivars of Vitis vinifera L. was studied in this work. Pollen viability was tested by the fluorochromatic reaction and germination was analyzed by in vitro assays, using two different media. Differences among cultivars in the number of pollen apertures were observed under light microscope. All the cultivars studied showed a higher percentage of tricolporated pollen, however, pollen grains containing one, two or four apertures were also observed. The cultivar Loureiro was the one with the higher percentage of pollen grains with four apertures (3.8%) and Touriga Nacional presented 100% of tricolporated pollen grains. The viability analysis showed that 13 cultivars presented values higher than 50%, with 8 cultivars reaching values above 75%. The pollen germination rates vary greatly for the grapevine cultivars studied, three cultivars show low values of germination (under 14%) in the two media tested, which were Touriga Nacional, Cabernet Franc, and Cabernet Sauvignon while others presented high values of germination like Castelao, Loureiro, Malbec and Petit Verdot. No significant statistical differences between the percentages of germination in the two media studied were found for the majority of cultivars analyzed.