Morphological and Phenological Characterizations of Some Male and Female Promising Pistachio Genotypes from an Open-pollinated Population

Abstract

Pistachio is one of the most important and high economic nut crops in the world. In the present research, the phenological and pomological traits of twenty superior male genotypes (MG) and twenty superior female genotypes (FG) of a pistachio open-pollinated population were evaluated along with five Iranian commercial pistachio cultivars in Damghan, Iran. A multilayer perceptron neural network (MLP) was also used for sensitivity analysis of kernel and nut traits based on leaf and shoot properties. The nut dry weight in selected female genotypes was between 0.7 and 1.28 g, in kernel dry weight between 0.34 and 0.63 g, and in the percentage of split nuts were between 58% and 93%. FG17 with the largest nut and kernel length and FG18 genotype with big green kernel have the heaviest kernel and nut dry weight. Flowering time and nut harvesting times had wide variation among genotypes. The MG20 was identified as male genotypes with a long flowering period (12 days). According to MLP analysis, leaf length, inflorescence rachis length, and width had the highest sensitivity coefficient. The results indicated that most of the genotypes were suitable in terms of nut and kernel weight and size, and kernel color which can be examined for field trials. Furthermore, they could be useful as a parent to be crossed to generate appropriate populations or improve cultivars.