Maize landraces of the St. Lawrence-Great Lakes region of North America

Abstract

Thirty-five white maize (Zea mays L.) landraces were obtained by the Indian Agricultural Program of Ontario (IAPO) from native farmers in Ontario and New York State between 1986 and 1989. These landraces probably belong to the racial complex Northern Flints and Flours. The 35 landraces, one experimental population and one control hybrid were evaluated in field experiments at two sites in 1993 and 1994. Data were collected on 24 traits in order to characterize and classify the IAPO landraces. Most quantitative traits examined exhibited considerable variation among the IAPO landraces. Variation was also observed within many of the landraces for ear and cob colour, and for endosperm texture. Most ears had eight rows of kernels, but there was some variation for this among and within landraces. Based on seven traits from the two sites in 1994, the IAPO population was grouped into 10 clusters by centroid clustering analysis.