Plant Breeding

There are different methods of breeding turfgrass plants, however, a general approach is:

1. Decide on the species to improve.
2. Establish the aim, i.e. what do we want to improve for this grass. For example, improved wear tolerance, disease resistance, drought resistance, finer leaf, cutting at lower height, improved sward density, etc.?
3. Is the desired goal a trait which has good variation within the species? If so, this means there is a better chance of improving it.
4. Is it fairly easy to screen (this means to identify the particular trait being looked at for improvement - this is called a phenotype in contrast to a genotype which is to do with the plant genetics and is not an observable feature) and select desired plants?
5. Collect different lines (i.e. different looking individual plants, with varying beneficial traits) of the grass species and carry out hand cross pollination in various combinations.
6. Produce plants for the initial trial. These are typically cultivated in greenhouse trials (up to 3 years).
7. These are then planted out as in-house field trials (possibly over 3 years)
8. Evaluate plots and narrow down to a more limited and potentially promising selection and carrying out more widespread trials which are maintained under typical turf maintenance conditions for the desired purpose, e.g. for a golf green, football pitch etc.
9. Evaluate and send away for official trials by DEFRA for checking trueness to type - Distinctiveness, Uniformity and Stability (DUS) - to gain approval for the new cultivar.
10. If successful, and if adequate yields form seed production, then these will be listed in the BSPB annual Turfgrass Seed booklet and marketed by seed suppliers.
11. The total development process can typically take 12 ¯ 15 years.