Rootstock breeding program and development for Australian wine grapes

Abstract

Adoption of rootstocks suited to the Australian environment will be critical to the long-term sustainability of the Australian wine industry to offer protection against Australian bio-types of soil borne pests, reduce the impacts of high potassium soils, limited water supply, salinity, and enhance wine quality attributes.

Summary

The main purpose of the rootstock breeding program was to maintain the development of new rootstocks with characteristics suited to the Australian environment and industry needs. It aimed to screen new rootstock hybrid families against key selection criteria and investigate the inheritance of key traits to underpin development of future breeding strategies and identify new selections for further assessment as grafted plants.

The field performance, wine quality attributes, root-knot nematode and phylloxera resistance of promising rootstock selections grafted with key wine varieties (Chardonnay, Cabernet Sauvignon and Shiraz) were also assessed to identify selections for further development and potential release to industry. Studies were also undertaken to investigate rootstock effects on vine growth and productivity, mineral discrimination, water use efficiency and drought tolerance to underpin the development of accelerated screening techniques. Industry adoption of the 3 CSIRO low-medium vigour rootstocks, Merbein 5489, Merbein 5512 and Merbein 6262 was facilitated in different regions to enable assessment of Genotype x Environment interactions with vine performance, fruit composition and wine quality attributes. The phylloxera screening studies were undertaken in collaboration with Dr Kevin Powell, Department of Primary Industries PI Victoria, Rutherglen.