A BREEDING METHOD FOR ACCELERATED DEVELOPMENT OF COLD CHIPPING CLONESIN POTATO

The development of potato cultivars having acceptable chipping quality after cold storage is important because it reduces costs to growers w hile ensuring continuity of supply to processors throughout the year. Over 5100 single-hill progenies were planted to select for cold chippe rs. A breeding procedure for selecting and evaluating these progenies for cold chipping ability was used, and 38 desirable genotypes were id entified. These selections were increased in the second clonal generat ion and evaluated for yield, specific gravity, and seven chipping trea tments of varying storage duration/temperature/reconditioning duration and were compared to standard chipping cultivars Atlantic, Monona, No rchip, and Snowden. Twenty-two selections yielded greater than or equa l to Norchip the highest yielding cultivar, while 15 selections had a specific gravity greater than or equal to Atlantic, the highest specif ic gravity cultivar. Snowden was the best chipping cultivar overall an d some selections were not significantly different than Snowden. Overa ll, nine selections combined high yield and specific gravity with the ability to produce attractive chips from 4 degrees C. Single-hill sele ction for cold chipping could potentially save four years in the breed ing process by the identification of good parents, the recycling of go od parental cross combinations, and the evaluation of progeny for chip ping earlier in the breeding program.