Selection of male date palms (Phoenix dactylifera L.) at "Daouia" station (Oued Souf, Algeria) (original) (raw)

2014, Advances in Environmental Biology

Since antiquity, the date palm selection concerned only the female trees and never male ones, which called locally "Dokkars", in spite of their influence on the quality and the quantity of date production. A collection of palm trees from "Daouia" Agricultural Exploitation Company situated in Oued Souf, Algeria was studied during 2013. The laboratory physiological features (pollen viability by the vital coloring test and "in vitro" germination test), and the palm trees characteristics according to farmers (localization, maturity, production of spathes also pollen and pollen quality) were investigated. The obtained results showed the existence of a high variability in the physiological markers between the various pollen types, which reflects the great diversity of the "Dokkars". The pollen viability for the majority of palm trees was always higher than 75%, therefore, they considered of good quality. The farmers' observations concerning the descriptive characteristics of the palm trees are regarded as a complement of the study conducted in the laboratory. The factorial correspondence analysis showed the existence of correlation between the studied characteristics and the quality of pollen as well as the repartition of male date palms into three categories; good, fair and bad. The goal of this study is to select, on the level of "Daouia" station, the best male palm trees presenting a good genetic potential in order to multiply them vegetatively.

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