Annona Species Monograph.pdf - Crops for the Future

Chapter 9. Genetic Improvement
In short, the cost of annona cultivar development is too high compared with
the demand for superior grafted material, therefore, only a few private
companies or nurseries can afford a breeding program, e.g., Zill Nursery in
Boyton Beach, Florida.
Nakasone and Paull (1998) stated that only cherimoya and atemoya have
important named clonal cultivars. For other annonas, such as soursop, sugar
apple and custard apple, there are some selections and very few named
cultivars (Table 9.2).
In California, some old cultivars of cherimoya, such as ‘McPherson’,
‘Deliciosa’ and ‘Bays’, were selected and cloned from seedling plantings
(Nakasone and Paull, 1998). Grossberger (1999) stated that cv. ‘White’ is the
most important cultivar grown in California because of its large size.
However, ‘Booth’, as a very sweet cultivar, and ‘Pierce’, as a cultivar with
the best shape for packing, have been cultivated for a long time.
In Peru, considerable work has been done on the development of annona
cultivars, but they are not widely known outside Peru. Chile, Spain and New
Zealand grow cherimoya, as it is more tolerant of cold temperatures and has
more successful self-pollination than atemoya. ‘Reretai’ and ‘Burton’s
Wonder’ are the most important New Zealand cultivars while ‘Madeira’,
‘Mateus I’, ‘Perry Vidal’ and ‘Funchal’ are important cherimoya cultivars
grown on Madeira island (Nunes, 1997). Numerous cherimoya cultivars have
been reported in Spain and Fino de Jete identified as the finest commercial
cherimoya cultivar, mainly because of its good postharvest life (Hermoso and
Farré, 1997). In Ecuador, there are no single-cultivar orchards of cherimoya;
rather most orchards consist of plants propagated by seed. In some cases
there are plants grafted onto the local ecotypes known as Jaramillo and
Chumina, selected by farmers on the basis of yield and quality (Fuentes,
1999).
There is no well-established breeding programme for custard apple.
Nonetheless, a few cultivars have been mentioned, such as ‘Camino Real’, in
Guatemala, and ‘Fairchild Purple’ and ‘Young’, in Florida, USA (George et
al., 1999).
Soursop is largely planted by seed in most countries, including Mexico and
Brazil. Soursop clones are separated into groups, such as acid (for the
processing market) and low acid (for the fresh market), or juicy and nonjuicy
types. Seedling populations of soursop have been established in
Mexico, Malaysia and Brazil, permitting the selection of superior clones with
better yield and improved processing qualities (Pinto and Silva, 1996;
65