Red pak choy (Bok choy)

[oxbowfarm]

Rowan, a few of my Red Choi were bolting so I moved them to see what we could see. Alas...



No anthers! Definitely this variety from Johnny's is male sterile. You should independently confirm this, could be a different variety down in Oz.

[jondear]

I ended up with some strange/cool bok choy this year. I had a Rainbow Lacinato blooming with my Prize Choy. The petioles and leaf veins are shades of pink and purple. I planted seeds of both varieties and both are very similar. The late planting was good to avoid the worst of the flea beatles but poor for seed production. I have some seed left to try again next year, but I guess this year I'll only be able to test for cold hardiness.

[steev]

Well, the ability to test at all is a good thing.

[12540dumont]

I usually grow Tatsoi and Taisai (which I will still grow). But this year I not only saw the red, but a golden yellow! Shokushina and a ruffled called Fun Jen. I always get my Pak Choi from Kitazawa. They're in Oakland, I order Thursday and have them on Friday.

I didn't buy the red because I remember about them being sterile. But the Fun Jen and Golden Yellow are both hybrids....what do you think? Tim, have you grown these, anyone else?

Any guess as to whether these are male sterile?



I'd really love to find an o/p red, yellow and ruffled. I put a bunch of each of these in a bag and they look beautiful. The Tatsoi makes beautiful rosettes, the Taisai is makes a spoon shaped. (One is white the other is green stemmed), but boy the yellow makes them pop! Also, the yellow only takes 25 days. It's also yummy raw.

Greens are such a short season for me, as the heat ramps up. This year, I'm thinking of putting them in shade. Never enough greens come July.

It's a sad thing, by the time I have tomatoes, there's no lettuce.

Both Fun Jen & Golden Yellow are listed as Brassica Rapa var Chinensis...(Mustard?)

Breeding
Breeding of Chinese cabbage has received much attention from AVRDC (Taiwan) and from Asian seed companies. In the tropics, breeding is limited by difficult vernalization at ambient temperatures. If flowering can be induced in the field, plants are bagged for controlled pollination. If flowering has to be induced artificially, plants are dug out and vernalized in cold rooms. Part of the head may be cut to make bolting easier. Brassica rapa plants show inbreeding depression and clear heterosis in hybrids. F1 hybrid breeding using self-incompatibility started in the 1950s. Both genetic and cytoplasmatic male sterility occur naturally in Brassica species. Cytoplasmatic male sterility is now widely used to produce hybrids, systems based on genetic male sterility being impractical and costly. Anther microspore culture is used for the fast creation of completely homozygous lines. The breeding efforts resulted in early producing F1 hybrid cultivars for tropical lowland conditions, that combine medium firm heads with heat tolerance and resistance to major diseases (soft rot, anthracnose, downy mildew, leaf spot, viruses).
In caisin, hybrids are still of lesser importance, the advantages over open-pollinated cultivars being minor. Many improved cultivars are sold in large quantities in South-East Asia and southern China. Several breeding companies (Japan, China, Taiwan, Thailand) have small breeding programmes offering a wide variety of plant types. Some seed traders in Hong Kong offer good open-pollinated selections especially in the early bolting types. East-West Seed Company is the leading supplier of the late bolting type (‘Tosakan’) used in South-East Asia.
Pakchoi breeding is concentrated in Japan and China, and improved open-pollinated and hybrid cultivars are offered. Mushashino Seed is a leading supplier of tropical hybrids. Turnip breeding is mainly done by European and Japanese seed companies and many cultivars are available, but none are especially adapted to tropical conditions. Brassica rapa breeding programmes especially for tropical Africa have not yet been reported, the activities being limited to cultivar testing of Asian and European introductions. database.prota.org/PROTAhtml/Brassica%20rapa_En.htm

Does this mean it's hopeless?

[jondear]

This is what I am ending up with an op bok choi crossed with rainbow lacinato kale in the first generation. Maybe something useful will pop up in the f2.

[shoshannah]

Apr 22, 2012 18:15:54 GMT -5 oxbowfarm said:

Here are a few pics of some of our pac choi.
The red is the hybrid "Red Choi" the green is "Shuko" from Fedco which is open pollinated AFAIK.



It may be that the red choi isn't bred with cytoplasmic male sterility because they are pretty variable in phenotype. The intensity of the red varies from plant to plant. There are also some much more mustardy/turnipy off types with spiny hairs on the leaf and petiole surface. Here's one of them, I hope the hairs show on the pic. You can also sort of see that the petioles aren't nearly as fat and flared as a proper pac choi.


Heres another pic of the "Shuko". It is definitely a more vigorous grower than the red. Plants are about 40% bigger when planted on the same day. Maybe more efficient photosynthesis without the extra red pigment?



Sorry,  I haven't figured out how to circle the part that I want.

The middle picture of purple rapa looks like Frank Morton's 'Purple Rapa Pop Mix' at Wild Garden seed  www.wildgardenseed.com/index.php?cPath=46

"New colors for cold-season salad mix! This is a select population of breeding material crossing Pink Lettucy and Wong Bok with intensely purple-pink germplasm created with Scarlet Ohno. Selected for solid purple leaves, cold hardiness, and Sclerotinia resistance. Best color will manifest between the fall and spring equinoxes. For baby leaf or full bunches. Huge seeds for big competitive seedlings! Farm Original Variety!"

Scarlet ohno for the turnip root and red/purple color.  He also has the vivid choy mix.

I would like to try the scarlet ohno with a baby bok choy.  I like the leaves and fat stems of bok choy.  I wonder how the color holds up if you added it to wonton soup.  Turn my wontons pink?

Susan