Screening early autumn frost hardiness among progenies from Norway spruce seed orchards.

• Main Authors: Johnsen, Øystein, Apeland, Inger
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Finnish Society of Forest Science 1988-01-01
• Series: Silva Fennica
• Online Access: https://www.silvafennica.fi/article/5353

Nursery grown Norway spruce ( (L.) H. Karst.) seedlings from 12 different seed orchards were tested for early autumn frost hardiness using artificial freezing tests. Seed orchards containing grafted parent clones originating from high altitudes produced seedlings showing higher damage than commercial control seed lots of the commercial controls. A seed orchard containing both German and Norwegian clones produced seedlings showing high damage. The correlation between bud-set and frost damage was high at the provenance level, but lower at the half- and full-sib-levels. Families with good growth capacity in progeny field tests showed large between-family variation in frost damage in the artificial freezing tests. This indicates the possibility to combine high growth rate with acceptable autumn frost hardiness in the selection of parent trees.Picea abies