Variation in Reproductive Characteristics and Seed Production in the USDA Garlic Germplasm Collection

Abstract

Diverse garlic germplasm has proven to be essential for production of true seed. Yet, fertile accessions in garlic germplasm collections have not been characterized for breeders and researchers, and information on morphological characteristics associated with seed producing plants is very limited. The objective of this study was to evaluate reproductive characteristics and true seed production capacity in the USDA garlic germplasm collection. Most stable traits, such as flower stem appearance, opening ability of spathe, level of difficulty to remove bulbils, tepal color, umbel shape, and the number of flowers per umbel, were similar across populations evaluated. Other characteristics including position of stigma, tepal closure, pollen viability, time of flowering, scape senescence rate, and number of seeds produced by individual plants varied within accession evaluated. Of 47 accessions, 19 produced true seeds (from 48.5 to 1.5 seeds per plant) in the Central Valley of California. Seed production in the germplasm evaluated is adequate to initiate garlic breeding projects.