Further evidence on the inheritance of reproductive mode in Brachiaria

Abstract

The most important tropical forages are Brachiaria spp. Existing cultivars are natural, polyploid, aposporous apomicts. Breeding programs seek to combine attributes from the tetraploid apomiets B. brizantha and B. decumbens. Apomixis is monogenic and dominant. We sought to synthesize an allogomous, sexual, breeding population containing germplasm from selected apomicts. Apospory was not detected in a large open-pollinated progeny of sexual hybrids from sexual-by-apomictic crosses.