The phenology of seed-propagated globe artichoke

Abstract

The ability of globe artichoke to produce inflorescences (capitula) during the autumn when the market price is highest is lost when plants are propagated from seed, as are most F 1 hybrid cultivars. To gain an understanding of the phenology of seed-propagated globe artichoke, both vernalised and nonvernalised seedlings grown from open pollinated progeny of 'Spinoso sardo' plants were transplanted into the field at two monthly intervals covering a whole year. Final leaf number and the date of unfolding of each leaf were used to calculate the phyllochrons. The average final leaf number increased from 24 to 88 in response to increasing daylength above an approximately 11 h threshold during the first 30 days after emergence, and this variate explained about 90% of the variation in the thermal time taken to reach the bolting stage. The average phyllochron ranged from 56 to 96°Cd among the six emergence dates and was the major underlying physiological cause of the loss of early flowering shown by seed-propagated plants. Genotypic variation for phyllochron within an emergence date was strongly associated with variation for the length of the emergence to bolting stage period. The limited effect of vernalisation on development indicated that the late flowering tendency of seed-propagated plants cannot be attributed to an unfulfilled cold requirement.

Artichoke: botanical, agronomical, phytochemical, and pharmacological overview

“…Seed production occurs through free pollination (producing a high genetic, phenotypic and phonological variability) or creation of F1 hybrids which are more uniform in behaviour. Artichoke phenology has been described by Archontoulis et al (2010) according to the BBCH scale and Virdis et al (2009Virdis et al ( , 2014 have studied the genetic factors and environmental requirements for timing of leaf emission (phyllochron) and head production. Flower induction requires a critical photoperiod of at least 10.5 h and a thermal sum of at least 200-250°C with a base temperature of 7-9°C, and aartichoke does not survive at less than -10°C (Bianco 1990).…”

“…Starting from the 100 references cited in the present review, 81 studies were selected, whereas 19 items were discarded since reporting not relevant information. These included an international on-line database on crop production (FAO 2013), 3 books of general interest about medicinal plants (Schauenberg and Paris 1977;Chevallier 1996) and herbs (Fleming 1998), 2 monographs on the Cilento National Park (SouthWest Italy) dealing with dyeing plants (De Falco and di Novella 2011) and multifunctional sustainable agriculture (Amato et al 2011), respectively, a review (Verpoorte et al 2008) and a methodological paper (Incerti et al 2013) on plant metabolomics, and 11 book chapters and research articles reporting on artichoke horticulture (Bianco 1990, Cantore andBoari 2009), breeding (Lanteri and Portis 2008), phenology (Virdis et al 2009(Virdis et al , 2014Archontoulis et al 2010), origin and evolution (Rottenberg and Zohary 1996;Sonnante 2004, 2009), and population genetics (Portis et al 2005;Sonnante et al 2008). …”

Artichoke Biorefinery: From Food to Advanced Technological Applications

“…Nevertheless, the length of the crop cycle negatively influences yields and the quality of the heads. This led artichoke growers to take an interest in the development of new seed-propagated cultivars for annual crops [ 9 , 10 , 11 ]. The world production of artichoke accounts for about 1678 Ktons, and Italy is the largest producer with 390 Ktons of artichokes in the world, followed by Egypt (324 Ktons), Spain (208 Ktons), and Perù (155 Ktons) [ 12 ].…”

Application of modern agronomic and biotechnological strategies to valorise worldwide globe artichoke (Cynara cardunculus L.) potential - an analytical overview

“…For a number of years a factor limiting the widespread cultivation of annual globe artichoke crops was the lack of varieties suitable for an annual cycle that would guarantee balanced yield and quality of heads (Virdis et al, 2014). As for pathologic and economic disadvantages of the vegetative multiplication method, Italian globe artichoke breeding programs make efforts to create potential seed propagated cultivars.…”