Development of new winter and spring wheat varieties in Latvia

The newest wheat varieties developed at the State Stende Cereal Breeding Institute are winter wheat ‘Fredis’ and spring wheat ‘Uffo‘ and ‘Robijs‘. The winter wheat variety ‘Fredis‘ (‘Donskaya Polukarlikovaya‘/‘Abe‘//‘Lowrin 24‘) was developed from 1986 to 2002. The variety has good winter hardiness (7-9 points), earliness (growing period 212-215 days from 1 January), and average yield is 6.0 t ha ^-1. Grain quality is suitable mostly for food. The variety was registered in the Latvian Plant Catalogue in 2007 and in the Estonian Plant Catalogue in 2011. In the period from 1992 to 2007, the new spring wheat variety ‘Uffo‘ (Sigma/Eta) was created. Variety ‘Uffo‘ is a mid-early variety, with yield potential 6-8 t ha^-1, and moderate lodging resistance (5-7 points). Grain quality is suitable for food and feed. The variety ‘Uffo‘ was included in the Latvian Plant Catalogue in 2008 and in the Estonian Plant Catalogue in 2009. The spring wheat variety ‘Robijs‘, obtained from the crossing combinations Dragon/Anninia//Fasan//Fasan by anther culture, was developed at the State Stende Cereal Breeding Institute in collaboration with the Institute of Biology Latvian University from 2000 to 2007. The variety is a middle-early wheat, and is characteriszed by high yield potential (6-8 t ha^-1), moderate resistance to lodging (7 points). It has moderate resistance to powdery mildew (3-5 point) and brown rust (10-25%). The grain quality is suitable for food. The variety was included in the Latvian Plant Catalogue in 2011.