The results of six-row barley breeding and the genetic origin of varieties released

Abstract

This article deals with the results achieved in the breeding of six-row barley at Hankkija Plant Breeding Institute since the beginning of scientific barley breeding in the 1910s, with special reference to earliness and genetic origin of the varieties. In Finland, barley is grown in the northern border of plant production up to the 67th parallel. Through centuries it has been an important cereal but a rapid expansion in the acreage occurred only in the mid-1970s. Today the acreage of barley is close to 700,000 hectares. Most of the crop is used for feed, the rest for malting. Adaptation to Finnish conditions, with a short growing season and acid soils, has always been the major aim inbreeding. The genetic basis for the beginning of barley breeding was locally adapted landraces which had reached Finland from east and west. The landraces showed extensive genetic variations. Through selection, a total of eight varieties three four-row, one six-row and four two-row varieties were developed. The most important was the extremely early variety Olli which has been an important variety not only in Finland but also in Canada. After the variation of landraces was fully utilized, the positive characteristics of different varieties were combined by crossings. A total of eight six-row varieties have been developed since Olli. These varieties are presented in brief. It is worth noticing that all the varieties are nearly totally of Scandinavian origin. The extremely early variety Olli is included in the pedigree of all the eight varieties released since Olli (1927). The percentage of wide crosses is minimal. However, in spite of the narrow gene pool, breeding work has produced several successful varieties which have covered are markable proportion of the total barley acreage. This may be a result of good adaptation of landraces and the first cultivars to the extreme weather and soil conditions prevailing in Finland. Furthermore, although the earliness of landraces or Olli has not been exceeded, improvements in other characteristics, e.g. yielding potential, straw stiffness and malting quality, have considerably contributed to the production of Finnish barley.