Rebsie's Red-Podded Peas

[triffid]

The eminent Rebsie Fairholm has posted an update regarding her most recent advancements in the quest for the red mangetout.

https://daughterofthesoil.blogspot.com/2019/08/red-podded-pea-update-f6-crop-and-beyond.html

Many congratulations to her and how bloody exciting!!

[Rebsie Fairholm]

The very humbled Rebsie Fairholm has just registered on this forum and greatly appreciates such a nice welcome, thank you.

[AndrewB]

Oooh! Just saw this now! Over to read it!

And welcome to the new forum Rebsie! Your potato breeding book is one of my favorites! I look forward to seeing if you do a pea breeding one as well!

[Raymondo]

Excellent. Congrats on the breakthrough Rebsie.

[PhilaGardener]

Welcome over here, Rebsie!  So great to have you reawaken your blog and jump into the pool again!

[AndrewB]

I'm planning my 2020 efforts for my version of a red podded edible-pod variety.

I just selected the most wrinkled seeds from my poor tasting red-snap line. Im hoping the wrinkled seeds may have more sugar genes and may taste better than the main line.

Im also planning on planting these all in trays and selecting from these the ones with hyper-tendrils first. I noticed the last two seasons that hyper-tendrils have suddenly appeared in my red snaps after being hidden for so long.

I'm planning on breeding these with Dan Quickert's legacy 'Midnight Snow'. The best purple snow pea I know of and have. Hoping it will help me speed breed these while maintaining all the purple genes and needing only one generation for yellow pods to select back.

[gmuller]

Ooh, I only just picked up on this thread. Rebsie's blog got me started in vege breeding, and inspired my first efforts in purple and yellow snow peas.
Here's my latest two dwarf red blushed snows - the first 50 cm high, with lovely red veins, and the second about 20 cm high, with more red. Sorry, they are a bit too advanced to show the colour properly. I haven't been able to taste any - not enough pods and i need the seed. The first looks very snow-like, with curvy pods and both have constricted pods round the seeds.

[PhilaGardener]

Rebsie's work has been an inspiration for many of us, and it was neat to see this thread pop up and hear all these progress reports.

The plants in your second picture are really short.  Were dwarf alleles intentionally introduced by incorporating a line like Tom Thumb or did the trait arise spontaneously?

[gmuller]

The plants in your second picture are really short.  Were dwarf alleles intentionally introduced by incorporating a line like Tom Thumb or did the trait arise spontaneously?

Hi Phila,
I didn't intentionally incorporate dwarf traits. My guess is dwarfism was lurking somewhere in the genes.
Bugger! I was trying to be all Lofthousian with this project from now on (Hey, look at the nice trait I've got - don't care how i got, just going forward with it...) but now you've prodded my slightly dormant curiosity gene again...
Now I'm going to have to dig out the stud books, and spend hours trying to read my smudged and incomplete pencil written notes to figure out why... There goes my Zen retirement
GM

[AndrewB]

I just planted all my red podded peas "Rebsie style" in some root trainers. I'm proceeding with my plan to cull those that don't have hyper-tendrils, which is why I am starting them all in root trainers as the hyper-tendril trait is very apparent even in the early seedling stage.

Then I can proceed with plan #2 and cross them with Midnight Snow for an improved red-podded pea in the F2 generation.

[AndrewB]

I just planted all my red podded peas "Rebsie style" in some root trainers. I'm proceeding with my plan to cull those that don't have hyper-tendrils, which is why I am starting them all in root trainers as the hyper-tendril trait is very apparent even in the early seedling stage.

Then I can proceed with plan #2 and cross them with Midnight Snow for an improved red-podded pea in the F2 generation.

most of my red podded seedlings are up. unfortunately i see zero hyper tendrils. I planted an emergency batch of the non wrinkled seeds to see if any of those are hyper tendriled. Most likely i will just have to pick the best from this batch to plant without hyper tendrils. Oh well, these are likely the sweetest best tasting ones of the batch anyway, so that is good. Would have been nice to throw in another useful trait while i had the opportunity.

[Ferdzy]

My feeling about peas (and beans too) is one of the determinants for sweet, good flavour is that the plant has lots of leaves. That's one of the reasons why pole beans and peas are widely regarded generally as having better flavour than bush beans and peas.

So I'm not too surprised that the best-tasting peas of this cross are not hyper tendriled - it seems expected to me.

[AndrewB]

My feeling about peas (and beans too) is one of the determinants for sweet, good flavour is that the plant has lots of leaves. That's one of the reasons why pole beans and peas are widely regarded generally as having better flavour than bush beans and peas.

So I'm not too surprised that the best-tasting peas of this cross are not hyper tendriled - it seems expected to me.

Well I don't actually know that these are the best tasting of the bunch. These were the most wrinkled seeds of the bunch which might have more sugar in the seeds. But it is a big maybe because there are a lot of genes that contribute to sweet flavor in both seeds and pods. Without actually knowing for sure selecting the most wrinkled seeds was my best guess.

But hyper tendrils and wrinkled seeds are independent on different chromosomes if I remember correctly so they shouldn't correlate. I think oddly enough hyper tendril plants have higher productivity because more light reaches each leaf contrary to what one might expect. And I would think less disease because of less leaves on top of one another,  but its not a deal breaker and its perfectly fine not to prefer the trait.

[Ferdzy]

I'm a lot less scientific in my thought about peas than you are, it has to be said. 

Mind you, my impression again is that I've had some very good tasting non-wrinkled peas... if you get them at the right moment. They seem less likely to hold well to me, which is also a big consideration with peas. There is already such a short window of optimum picking with them that any that last a little longer are to be searched out.

[AndrewB]

I've made a few crosses for tasty red podded peas this summer and will continue to keep trying. Will take 1 generation to recover a yellow pod underneath though. A pesky rabbit keeps chomping on some of my red podded parents though, so hopefully enough of my crosses make it and are successful. Maybe i should plant some sacrificial lettuce.