Rgon: a Regional Strategy for Fusarium Head Blight Improvement

In the hard winter wheat region of the Great Plains, Fusarium head blight (FHB) is a sporadic disease. Drought is more common than rain at flowering, however, within the region, rain at and after flowering often occurs in some parts of the region leading to severe FHB in localized areas. Hence the need to identify lines with FHB tolerance is needed, but most plant breeding programs have insufficient plant pathology support and financial support to actively pursue FHB tolerance. The Regional Germplasm Observation Nursery (RGON) is a USDA coordinated nursery that screens early generation experimental lines for a number of diseases, insects, and abiotic stresses. Every public and private wheat breeding effort in the Great Plains submits between 10 and 40 lines for this collaborative screening effort. The USDA-University of Nebraska wheat improvement effort, with support of US Scab Initiative efforts, proposes testing this nursery for FHB tolerance. The advantages of screening this nursery are: 1) all of the germplasm that is developed and eventually released in the hard winter wheat region will be screened for FHB tolerance, 2) public and private programs have equal access for entering lines into the nursery and for accessing the data, 3) germplasm within the RGON often has Chinese (used to enhance noodle and steamed bread quality) and eastern European (the genetic basis form much of the Great Plains winter wheats) parents from regions where FHB tolerance has been identified, 4) lines that show promise in the initial screen can be further tested for confirmation of the initial data, and 5) the identified germplasm is freely shared. 2000 National Fusarium Head Blight Forum 200 Germplasm Introduction and Enhancement DETECTION OF QTL LINKED TO FHB RESISTANCE IN SUMAI 3-DERIVED LINES I.A. Del Blanco*, R.C. Frohberg, R.W. Stack, S.F. Kianian and W.A. Berzonsky Plant Sciences Department and Plant Pathology Department, North Dakota State University, Fargo, ND, 58105 *Corresponding author: PH: (701) 231-6322; E-mail: [email protected]