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ARS Home » Southeast Area » Charleston, South Carolina » Vegetable Research » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #63517
Title: 'TENDER CREAM' SOUTHERNPEA

Author
item Fery, Richard
item DUKES, PHILIP - ARS (RETIRED)

Submitted to: HortScience
Publication Type: Peer Reviewed Journal
Publication Acceptance Date: 7/22/1996
Publication Date: N/A
Citation: N/A

Interpretive Summary: Cream-type southernpeas are a popular home-garden, fresh-market, and processing crop throughout the southern U.S. Chemical pesticides are widely used by industry to control insect pests, insect vectors of plant viruses, root-knot nematodes, and fungal diseases. Home gardeners have the same pest problems, but they often do not have access to alternative production sites or to the needed pesticides and pesticide application equipment. The USDA has released a new, multi-pest resistant, cream-type southernpea. The new cultivar, named Tender Cream, is resistant to the cowpea curculio, root-knot nematodes, southern bean mosaic virus, Cercospora leaf spot, southern blight, rust, and powdery mildew. Tender Cream has excellent yield potential. It outyielded the cream-type control in the 1992, 1993, and 1994 Regional Southernpea Cooperative Trails by 5.4%, 11.0%, and 18.8%, respectively. Canned samples of fresh Tender Cream mpeas scored well in three years of testing at the University of Arkansas. Tender Cream is recommended for use as a processing, home garden, and fresh market cultivar for spring, mid-season, and fall plantings throughout the southeastern U.S. Access to this new cultivar should allow both commercial growers and home gardeners to decrease their dependence upon chemical pesticides.

Technical Abstract: The USDA has released a new, cream-type southernpea (Vigna unguiculata) cultivar that is well adapted for production throughout the southern United States. The new cultivar, named Tender Cream, is the product of a conventional recurrent backcross breeding procedure to transfer the dominant Rk gene for root-knot nematode resistance from Floricream into Carolina Cream. Tender Cream originated from a bulked F5 population derived from the sixth backcross. The Tender Cream phenotype is quite similar to those of Carolina Cream and Bettergreen. The new cultivar is resistant to the cowpea curculio, root-knot nematodes, southern bean mosaic virus, Cercospora leaf spot, southern blight, rust, and powdery mildew. Tender Cream outyielded the cream control in the 1992, 1993, and 1994 Regional Southernpea Cooperative Trials by 5.4%, 11.0%, and 18.8%, respectively. It outyielded its root-knot nematode susceptible Carolina Cream isoline by 22.3% in a replicated 1994 test conducted in a field infested with a natural population of the southern root-knot nematode. Canned samples of fresh Tender Cream peas scored well during three years of testing at the University of Arkansas. Tender Cream is recommended for use as a processing and home garden cultivar for spring, mid-season, and fall plantings.