Combining abilities of tree and fruit quality characteristics in the hybrid pear (Pyrus communis L.) population and genetic parameter estimates of these characteristics

Study was conducted to plan target-oriented breeding studies in pear. As a result, genetic parameters of phenological, pomological, chemical, and morphological characteristics and the breeding values of the parental varieties were calculated. While all the traits examined were quantitative, genotype effect in the inheritance of the full blooming time (31%) was determined at lower level than the harvest time (83%) and the time from full bloom to harvest (86%). While the narrow-sense heritability of fruit width and fruit length traits was calculated as 11% and 10%, respectively, heritability of fruit weight (38%) was found to be higher due to the pyriform shape of the pear. Narrow-sense heritability of the investigated chemical properties were ranked as titratable acidity (17%)< soluble solid content (23%) and pH (27%). Tree characteristics, namely, branching angle, shoot length and node number were found to have narrow sense heritabilities respectively at 35%, 40% and 52%. For obtaining early genotypes, 'Akça' stands out as both maternal (204.88 days) and pollinator (211.32 days). In terms of increasing fruit weight, 'Kieffer' (109.53 g) as the maternal and 'Williams' (137.63 g) as pollinator came to the fore. 'Kieffer' (73.49) as the maternal and 'Moonglow' (68.54) as pollinator showed promising results in terms of cheek formation in their hybrids. 'Ankara' showed superior performance as a pollinator in breeding genotypes with high sugar (15.67%) and acid (0.39%) genotypes. 'Maggness' (15.71%) drew attention as the maternal in terms of sugar, and 'Kieffer' (0.39%) as the maternal in terms of acidity.