Productivity, cold hardiness and forage quality of spineless progeny of the Opuntia ficus-indica 1281 x O. lindheimerii 1250 cross in Mendoza plain, Argentina

GUEVARA, J.C.; FELKER, P.; BALZARINI, M.G.; PAEZ, S.A.; ESTEVEZ, O.R.; PAEZ, M.N.; ANTUNEZ, J.C.

Journal of Professional Association for Cactus Development

Journal of Professional Association for Cactus Development

Año: 2011 vol. 13 p. 48 - 48

1938-6648

he specialized photosynthetic system, Crassulacean Acid Metabolism (CAM) in cactus that provides several fold greater conversion of water to dry matter (DM) than grasses and broadleaf plants makes them especially suited for forage production in arid lands. Unfortunately the spineless fast growing Opuntia ficus-indica, that is widely used for forage in Brazil, North Africa and Mexico, is poorly adapted to regions outside the tropics due to lack of tolerance to freezing weather. To overcome this limitation, a wide interspecific cross was made between a fast growing, spineless, frost sensitive O. ficus-indica and spiny, cold tolerant, slow growing Texas native O. lindheimerii with the objective of combining the high productivity and spinelessness of the O. ficus-indica parent with the cold hardiness of the Texas native parent. The first part of this work compared 10 spineless progeny of this cross to the most cold hardy spineless forage species to date, i.e. O. ellisiana for forage produ