Identification of stripe rust resistant selections from wheat landraces currently under cultivation in Turkey

The International Winter Wheat Improvement Program (Turkey-CIMMYT-ICARDA) conducted a national inventory of wheat landraces in Turkey from 2009-2014. The material in this study were landraces from 10 provinces (Afyon, Aksaray, Burdur, Eskişehir, Karaman, Konya, Kütahya, Nevşehir, Niğde and Uşak) collected in 2009-2010, head-rowed and increased for evaluation in a yield trial in 2012-2013 in Konya province (200 entries, 2 replicates). Drought tolerant cultivars Karahan-99 and Gerek-79 served as checks, each repeated 8 times. The average yıeld of selections from the landraces was 2.95 t/ha compared to 3.7 t/ha for Karahan-99 and 2.8 t/ha for Gerek-79. The mean yıeld of the ten best landrace selections was 3.9 t/ha. In separate disease tests 5% and 11% of selections from the landraces were resistant and moderately resistant to stripe rust, respectively. Four landraces selections (Sahman-Aksaray, Kırmızı Buğday-Uşak, Kobak-Kütahya, Koca Buğday-Burdur) had higher grain yield than Karahan-99 and Gerek-79 and were resistant to stripe rust. There is some likelihood that this resistance is of a durable nature. The selected lines can be used in breeding programs targeting improved dryland performance while improving durability of stripe rust resistance in modern cultivars.