Abstract
Calla lily is a mainstream floricultural crop but its commercial success is limited by severe susceptibility to soft rot. This disease can be controlled to some extent by implementing appropriate cultural practices but developing resistant cultivars against this pathogen is the most promising long-term strategy. The purpose of this work was to develop new cultivars resistant to this bacterial disease by initiating an appropriate breeding programme. Field observations of 120 resistant lines selected by a leaf-disk susceptibility test were carried out and survival rates were measured. Two lines were selected after further evaluation of resistance level, flowering characteristics and following guidelines for conduct of tests for distinctness, homogeneity, and stability. Further preference testing of the selected lines by growers, consumers, researchers and agricultural advisors was carried out with excellent results. The selected new lines are ‘Silky White’ and ‘Mont Blanc’ which emerge as the first, soft-rot resistant calla lily cultivars from our breeding program.
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