Inheritance of glume color and gluten strength in durum wheat

Summary The correlation between glume color and gluten strength and the heritability of each trait was estimated in two durum wheat crosses. Brown glume color appeared to be dominant to white in both crosses. In one cross, glume color was clearly controlled by one gene while in the other cross it appeared to be controlled by one or two genes with modifiers. The heritability of gluten strength was moderately high. The correlation of F₂ glume color and F₃ gluten strength was high (r=0.66 and 0.78) indicating that F₂ glume color was a good predictor of gluten strength in the F₃ generation. Selection for glume color appears to be an effective breeding strategy for improving gluten strength in those environments where glume color differences are easily detected.