Yield improvement of oilseed rape (Brassica napus L.) in a low rainfall environment. I. Utilization of genes for early flowering in primary and secondary gene pools

Abstract

The extent to which time to flowering of a Brassica napus commercial cultivar could be reduced through utilization of genes in its primary and secondary pools was examined with particular reference to yield improvement in lower rainfall environments. The B. napus breeding line RU2 and the B. campestris population Chinoli C42, which were used as sources of early flowering genes to be incorporated into the commercial B. napus cultivar Wesbrook, flowered significantly earlier than Wesbrook with or without vernalization and/or long days. In the cross of Wesbrook with RU2, the substantial variation in flowering time in the F2 was highly heritable (hn2 = 0.79), and some plants in the F2 and first backcross to Wesbrook flowered earlier than the early flowering parent RU2. Many lines flowering much earlier than Wesbrook were still obtained after two generations of recurrent backcrossing to Wesbrook and subsequent selfing without selection at any stage. Variation in flowering time among these lines primarily reflected differences in growth rate as measured by the rate of leaf node development. F2 plants derived from the cross between Wesbrook and the B. campestris population Chinoli C42 varied widely in chromosome number and flowering time, but there was no relationship between pre-anthesis development and chromosome number. Two generations of recurrent backcrossing to Wesbrook and subsequent selfing without selection at any stage produced a series of lines all having the normal B. napus chromosome complement. All these lines flowered significantly earlier than Wesbrook, and the earliest flowering line flowered at the same time as the early flowering B. campestris parent. The implications of these results are discussed with particular reference to developing agronomically superior B. napus cultivars closely adapted to lower rainfall environments in the Western Australian wheatbelt and elsewhere in southern Australia.