High Outcrossing Peas (Pisum Sativum)

[Andrew Barney]

I have 24 Nap Gene peas.

Oh, hey, awesome!

Are you planning on growing them out this summer? I don't necessarily need any seed back right now, and since i am wanting to grow between 8-10 of my various other pea varieties it might be better if someone could grow those out for me anyway. Let me know what you think. And thanks Dianne!

-Andrew

[Diane Whitehead]

I had such bad luck with my vegetables last year - fawns sneaking under the fence, a tree blowing down across the fence so deer got in again - I had better make sure I really have things secure before I grow anything irreplaceable.

It is difficult sending seeds to the States with all your regulations.  I wonder if there is someone else in Canada who would like to grow out and increase some of these seeds.

[Andrew Barney]

I had such bad luck with my vegetables last year - fawns sneaking under the fence, a tree blowing down across the fence so deer got in again - I had better make sure I really have things secure before I grow anything irreplaceable.

It is difficult sending seeds to the States with all your regulations.  I wonder if there is someone else in Canada who would like to grow out and increase some of these seeds.

Yes, that would be fine with me. Brenda Copping comes to mind. Maybe Ferdzy? Dominic Hamelin-Johnston?

Brenda might also have seed for NAP gene already.

[Ferdzy]

I heard my name!

I could possibly squeeze in a few more peas. They wouldn't be particularly isolated, not if you don't want the deer to eat 'em...also keep in mind that I have bean anthracnose in the garden which does not have much effect on the peas but they could pick it up. But keeping those things in mind, I could if you wanted me to.

[gmuller]

For the purposes of keeping stuff in one place, bumping this topic.
Has anyone made progress or have other information on outcrossing peas? The references I can find are to papers in Pisum Newsletter, but it doesn't look like i can get access to this journal.
I did however come across an interesting report of a joint landrace collecting expedition between Australian and Chines researchers in 2004 in Quinhai province, looking for frost resistant varieties.
https://www.bioversityinternational.org/fileadmin/PGR/article-issue_156-art_1-lang_en.html

If we can identify some accession numbers for interesting material i can apply to the Australian grains genebank for seed.
gregg

[Andrew Barney]

For the purposes of keeping stuff in one place, bumping this topic.
Has anyone made progress or have other information on outcrossing peas? The references I can find are to papers in Pisum Newsletter, but it doesn't look like i can get access to this journal.
I did however come across an interesting report of a joint landrace collecting expedition between Australian and Chines researchers in 2004 in Quinhai province, looking for frost resistant varieties.
https://www.bioversityinternational.org/fileadmin/PGR/article-issue_156-art_1-lang_en.html

If we can identify some accession numbers for interesting material i can apply to the Australian grains genebank for seed.
gregg

I'm not sure. Maybe.

There is another gene or line i found in the JIC Pgene database that mentioned open keels in a place i wasn't expecting. Let me see if i can track that down and post a gene / accession number here.

As for nap gene, here is a report from last year:

Was sorting through my crop of "nap gene" peas. Luckily someone sent me back a small packet I had shared with them that they never grew. When i harvested seeds and sorted them today i noticed a majority had shelling type pods and small round seeds (though they did have water issues this year). A minority came out with pulverize-to-dust snap pods, and wrinkled seeds as expected. Considering the shelling type pods I would speculate that these were unexpected F1 hybrids from last time I grew "nap gene". This is interesting and exciting because this suggests I was right that this variety in having the mutation to have an open keel allows this variety to be pretty much an obligate outcrossing variety in the right conditions with the right pollinators. I again noticed lots of leaf cutter bees this year feasting on the pea leaves.

From simple math by weight of seeds, "nap gene" seems to be between 79%-86% outcrossing! This is not entirely correct as the normal seeds are larger and this year the others had tiny seeds maybe due to overcrowding and semi-drought. But even with this error it seems this variety of pea could be an 80% outcrosser! Could be very useful for someone wanting to breed for pest or disease resistance without needing to hand cross as much.

EDIT: of course it could be possible I hand crossed these last time I grew them and forgot. Hmm. Now im not sure. Regardless I like this variety. It tastes good as a snap pea as it is with no breeding needed.

another idea to increase outcrossing peas is just to try and attract pollinators more. Combining yellow cit flowers with those with anthocyanins might make a more colorful and attractive flower to leaf cutter bees? Combining that with the crown pea type might also increase showiness of the flowers to attract the bees more?

I am awaiting some seeds for P. fulvum hybrids from Turkey. Hopefully I'll finally be able to work with orange flowers!

[Andrew Barney]

For the purposes of keeping stuff in one place, bumping this topic.

If we can identify some accession numbers for interesting material i can apply to the Australian grains genebank for seed.
gregg

The three best genes to screen very carefully are nap, biv, and coch.

I have nap and they do indeed have fairly open keels and not too much other abnormalities that cause issues. I like this one.

I thought I had coch, but I'm thinking I don't (I think the one i originally requested was named cochleata and may not be the same. The one year i grew them I did not see open flowers. Requesting known coch lines would be worth further study by someone. Wt 11743 - coch, Wt 15137 - cochw, Wt 15446 - cochp, Gott 444a - cochg, Wt 11291 - cochhet (different in size). coch = WL 1743 (JI 1824), coch = FN 3185 / 1325 (JI 3596), coch<w = WL 5137 (JI 2165), coch<g = WL 6111 (JI 3121), coch<p = WL 5446 (2757), coch<het = Wt 11291 (JI 2459).

http://data.jic.ac.uk/pgene/Default.asp?ID=195

Haven't explored biv. SGE-0666 (or JI 3056) https://www.seedstor.ac.uk/search-infoaccession.php?idPlant=26443

http://data.jic.ac.uk/pgene/Default.asp?ID=855

maybe sup superpetaloidum http://data.jic.ac.uk/pgene/Default.asp?ID=650

[gmuller]

Thanks so much Andrew. I'll have a look at the JIL database and see if I can match some accession numbers to my local seedbank list.
Gregg

[gmuller]

Just checked all the accessions here, and unfortunately none of the JI numbers with the targeted genes is available here. pity.
gm

[gmuller]

just some general info - this paper "Field assessment of outcrossing from transgenic pea (Pisum sativum L.) plants" reports 0.07% outcrossing in field peas
and this paper in Plos1 "Genetic structure of wild pea (Pisum sativum subsp. elatius) populations in the northern part of the Fertile Crescent reflects moderate cross-pollination and strong effect of geographic but not environmental distance" reports up to 40% outcrossing in wild pea populations - might be a useful place to start, but it may be a long road to good horticultural plants
gm

[Andrew Barney]

Thanks for looking Gregg. Did you also check for nap gene? You probably did.

http://data.jic.ac.uk/pgene/Default.asp?ID=486

Wl 1255 (ji 134)

JI0134 (it seems jic now adds zeros)

https://www.seedstor.ac.uk/search-infoaccession.php?idPlant=23534

Passport data says WBH 1255. USDA says W6 34980.

https://npgsweb.ars-grin.gov/gringlobal/accessiondetail?id=1800646

Try searching for the name Navicula Apertus.

The term for biv is Bivexillum.

And coch is cochlearis.

@Andrew I think “crd” also increases leaf size, but changes the flower structure. This could be of interest to you?

http://data.jic.ac.uk/pgene/Default.asp?ID=788

Abnormal flowers. Aleae often absent. Carina elements sometimes free.

... not familiar with that flower terminology... not sure what that actually means...

[Andrew Barney]

I wonder how much the outcrossing is due to genetics vs pollinators. I suspect it is more up to the pollinators and whether peas with colored flowers grow in an area year after year in significant quantities. I've seen an establishment of leafcutter bees that like the snow peas on my parents property after years of growing a large amount of diverse peas.

Its hard to say how many bee crosses have happened there since I did a lot of crosses myself and didn't keep good track of them all. But it sure seemed like more hybrids appeared than I did. But it could have just been that peas multiply easily.

[Andrew Barney]

Gregg, even with AU strict import issues, do they not allow imports from foriegn genebanks that can usually prove that the seeds are free from pests & diseases? Does AU not have a similar small seeds lot permit?

The JIC in particular seems to know how to cooperate with other countries laws on seed quarantine inspections.

[Steph S]

I noticed last summer that later in the season, paper wasps became very interested in the pea flowers.  Perhaps there was a pest involved, IDK.  But there was enough wasp activity to keep me from picking in the heat of the day.  I suppose that, like leaf cutter bees, the wasps could tear into the flower.
IDK if pollinator activity alone would be enough to increase outcrossing without some helpful genes.  Just based on the degree of self pollination that seemed to be the case whenever you have an open flower.  Even at a late-unopen stage the flowers here seemed to have already done the job. (But that is based on very few observations, since I've only made a few pea crosses for the first time last year).
Just wondering if there are genes in the wild peas, that delay anther maturity and self pollination until the flowers are actually open.

[Andrew Barney]

I noticed last summer that later in the season, paper wasps became very interested in the pea flowers.  Perhaps there was a pest involved, IDK.  But there was enough wasp activity to keep me from picking in the heat of the day.  I suppose that, like leaf cutter bees, the wasps could tear into the flower.

Just wondering if there are genes in the wild peas, that delay anther maturity and self pollination until the flowers are actually open.

The leaf cutter bees in Turkey seem to actually prefer using the flowers for their nests. So, very possible with the wasps.

There might be some delay genes in the wild species, but i'm not sure. It seems most are still fairly self pollinating, but some accessions are shown to be as high as 17%. Not sure if these are hybrids with P. sativum??

However, there were outliers: P. fulvum JI2527 (3.9%) and JI1796 (1.39%), and particularly two P. sativum subsp. elatius samples, UP_Serbia (17.5%) and IG52532 (17.33%), followed by IG52496 (8.65%) and IG140897 (8.63%), which can be explained by their admixture status, as revealed by STRUCTURE analysis. It is worth noting that in contrast to most of the samples, UP_Serbia is a recent collection, having produced only two generations ex situ. Similarly, IG52532 and IG52496 were collected in Turkey back in 1988, and IG140897 from Armenia was collected in 2004 (www.genesys-pgr.org). Together, these data indicate a very low natural outcrossing rate and a high genetic homogeneity of populations.

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-017-17623-4