Utilization of highland x temperate maize population
1990
Eagles, H.A. (Victorian Crops Research Institute, Victoria (Australia). Department of Agriculture and Rural Affairs)
A combination of climatic information and knowledge of the dispersion of maize over the 7000 year period since domestication was used to identify races with better adaptation to cool environments than the Corn Belt Dent cultivars currently used in temperate regions. These races came from the highland regions of Mexico and Peru. Experiments in controlled environments confirmed that races from the highlands of Mexico have superior endosperm based seedling growth than Corn Belt Dent cultivars while races from both highland tropical regions have superior phytosynthetically-based seedling growth. Less extensive experiments suggest that highland Mexican germplasm has superior tolerance to frost and superior ability to continue grain filling under declining autumn temperatures than Corn Belt Dent. Populations produced from crosses between highland Mexican and Corn Belt Dent germplasms produced lower yield in New Zealand than elite Corn Belt Dent synthetics but crosses of these populations to unrelated testers produced grain yields which were equivalent to crosses between elite Corn Belt Dent synthetics and the same testers. Testcrosses of the best partially-inbred lines from highland Mexican x Corn Belt Dent populations produced high yields at acceptable grain moistures, indicating that these types of germplasm can produce lines with a superior combining ability for cool environments. However, no testcrosses of lines selected from highland Peruvian x Corn Belt Dent populations produced high yields at low grain moistures
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