The pollination scheme for national and introduced sweet cherry (Prunus avium L.) cultivars in growing regions of the Republic of Serbia

Abstract

Sweet cherry (Prunus avium L.) is basically a self-sterile fruit species, showing gametophytic self-incompatibility (GSI), controlled by the multiallelic locus S. The knowledge of GSI system and practical application of its main principals have a key role in productivity of commercial sweet cherry orchards. Sufficient overlap in phenophase of full flowering is another crucial factor for effective pollination and fertilization success between compatible cultivars. Production of sweet cherry fruits in the Republic of Serbia is mainly based on the genetic potential of introduced cultivars, which are predominantly represented in the assortment structure. Up to now, three national sweet cherry cultivars have been named and released – Asenova Rana and Čarna (developed by planned hybridization at Fruit Research Institute, Čačak), and Canetova (selected from natural cherry population at Faculty of Agriculture, University of Belgrade). The assessment of an adequate pollenizer composition for both national and introduced sweet cherry cultivars in this research is based on determined S-allele constitution, parameters of pollen tube growth in vivo through the pistil tissue, and perennial average flowering time of pollinated cultivars in relation to the potential pollenizers. The research was conducted in the main sweet cherry growing regions of the Republic of Serbia (Western Serbia/Šumadija and the region of Belgrade), resulting in development of a pollination scheme for a total of 28 national and introduced cultivars. The application of pollination scheme in the plant material production and establishing new orchards could be of great importance for dissemination of commercially significant sweet cherry cultivars with adequate pollenizers. The results could also influence the breeding strategies in developing new sweet cherry genotypes with improved biological and productive characteristics, and application of molecular and reproductive biology methods in this research area.