INHERITANCE OF RESISTANCE TO POWDERY MILDEW IN THE CULTIVATED STRAWBERRY

Abstract

The inheritance of resistance to powdery mildew was investigated in 64-somewhat interdependent progenies produced among 32 North American strawberry cultivars or selections. The data were analyzed by both the quantitative method based on continuous variation and the Mendelian method based on discontinuous variation. The quantitative analysis indicated that non-additive variance was more important than additive variance and that epistatic variance was considerable. The Mendelian analysis supported the hypothesis that segregation depended on two additive genes for resistance and one epistatic gene far susceptibility. The breeding procedure of progeny selection followed by individual selection was suggested for the improvement of powdery mildew resistance in strawberry based on the complementary information obtained from both analyses.