The parentage of Pošip bijeli, a major white wine cultivar of Croatia

Abstract

Fourteen Croatian grape cultivars (Vitis vinifera L.) were analyzed at 25 polymorphic microsatellite loci and the alleles were analyzed for possible parent-progeny relationships. Alleles at 24 out of the 25 loci are consistent with Pošip bijeli (hermaphrodite) being the progeny of two other varieties, Zlatarica blatska bijeli and Bratkovina bijeli. A further search in a microsatellite database of over 300 cultivars revealed no other possible parents for Pošip. Likelihood analysis with observed allele frequencies indicated that the probability of the observed Pošip alleles is more than 10¹⁵ times higher for the presumptive parents than two random varieties and at least 300 times more likely than close relatives of the presumptive parents. The likelihoods were 1013 and at least 200, respectively, when the 95 % upper confidence limits of the allele frequencies were used in the analysis. Pošip and its presumptive parents have all been grown on the Dalmatian island of Korcula for many years, suggesting that this island is its origin. A comparison of representative groups of Croatian, Italian and Greek cultivars indicated that 11 out of the 13 Pošip alleles are more frequent in the Croatian gene pool than in the other two. Pošip and the two presumptive parental cultivars were characterized with 58 ampelographic and ampelometric descriptors. Pošip shares 50 out of the 58 characteristics with one or both of the parents and combines several desirable characteristics from both parents. Pošip has become increasingly popular in Dalmatian viticulture and has replaced some other white wine cultivars.