Biotech Studies 2010, Vol 19, Num, 1-2     (Pages: 036-043)

The Wild Species of Carthamus L. in Natural Flora of Turkey and Possibilities of Using Safflower Breeding

Yusuf ARSLAN 1 ,Duran KATAR 1 ,Hümeyra GÜNEYLİOĞLU 1 ,İlhan SUBAŞI 1 ,Bilal ŞAHİN 2 ,Ali Savaş BÜLBÜL 2

1 Tarla Bitkileri Merkez Araştırma Enstitüsü, Yenimahalle – ANKARA
2 Şap Enstitüsü, Çankaya – ANKARA
- Our country, as well as being at an intersection of three floristic regions, is rich – among many countries in the world, in terms of plant diversity since she is influenced by climatic differences (Atalay 1994, Arslan ve ark. 2002). In Turkish flora, there are 130 species and 1130 types from Asteraceae (Compositae) family. About 25 types of Carthamus L., a member of this family, are known to exist. The Carthamus L. species have the following types in the Anatolian flora; C. lanatus L., C. dentatus Vahl., C. persicus Willd (syn. C. flavescens Spreng), C. glaucus Bieb. subsp. glaucus, C. tenuis (Bois and Balansa) Bornm. tenuis and C. tenuis (Bois and Balansa) Bornm. subsp gracillimus (Davis 1975). In our country, safflower (C. tinctorius L.) is one of the most important reason for the lack of agricultural development of the existing safflower (C. tinctorius L.) cultivars to drought and cold tolerant of the lack of enough. According to aspire for example, sunflower is more sensitive to cold and drought, but in our country for more than 500 thousand hectares are in the field of agriculture. The biggest obstacle to stepping up the production of safflower in the Central and Eastern Anatolia regions of Turkey is the intolerance of its types to drought and cold weather. The main objective of the safflower improvement programmes is to eliminate these unfavourable conditions and also to improve the types resistant to cold and drought. The basics of breeding the types resistant to cold and drought depend on the types of wild Cartamus L. and through hybrid improvement methods these features will be conveyed to the cultures of Cartamus tinctorius. Keywords : Carthamus L. Species, Oil rate, seed productivity, tolerance to cold