Advances Achieved in Winter Peas (Pisum Sativum L.) Breeding at NARDI Fundulea

Ancuța Bărbieru

Institutul Național de Cercetare-Dezvoltare Agricolă Fundulea

Keywords: winter peas, varieties, yield, winter hardiness.

Abstract: Among the protein-producing crops, peas have the advantage of a shorter vegetation period and a less expensive technology, being at the same time an excellent precursor for autumn cereals. Despite all the progress made in creating more fall-resistant and more productive varieties, the expansion of the pea crop is hampered by large crop fluctuations (generated by the delay in sowing in certain years).

An already proven way to increase yields and reduce crop fluctuations can be to sow autumn peas. For this, at NARDI Fundulea started an extensive breeding program for obtaining pea genotypes that can be sown in autumn. The paper presented the news winter peas varieties (four) realised in the winter peas breeding program of the National Agricultural Research and Development Institute Fundulea. Ghittia F, Lavinia F, Andrada F and Olguța F are the most recent Romania winter peas varieties (Pisum sativum L.), those was selected by the pedigree method from the parental lines beeing of spring Romanian and foreign winter peas varieties. By creating the new winter pea varieties we have tried to combine the high TGW and plant height of spring pea line with the good winter hardiness and earliness from winter pea varieties.

Following the selection process, was identified a genotypes with good winter hardiness, associated with high yield and a good adaptability to the climatic conditions from Romania.

Experimental results obtained in centers of the State Institute for Varieties Testing and Registration (SIVTR) during the period 2018-2020 and also those obtained at NARDI Fundulea, were accessed to characterize the news varieties Ghittia F, Lavinia F, Olguța F and Andrada F in comparison to Nicoleta and Spectral F used as control varieties.