Early-ripening confectionary sunflower variety Belochka

Belochka is an early-ripening confectionary sunflower variety. The variety was developed in 2010-2015 in the laboratory of sunflower OP-variety breeding of the sunflower department of VNIIMK. It was obtained from the variety Oreshek by the method of multiple individual selection of elite plants with an evaluation of progeny and cross-pollination of the plants best by economic-valuable traits and resistance to the flower parasite broomrape. It is distinguished by the uniformity of plants height, flowering and ripening terms, and the vegetative period shortened by 2-3 days in comparison with the standard variety Oreshek. The plants height is 165-175 cm. Thousand-seed weight is within 100 g at a plant population of 40 thousand pieces/ha. According to the competitive trials data of 2015-2017, variety Belochka exceeded the yield of variety Oreshek by 0.16 t/ha. The new variety Belochka is resistant to the group of broomrape races and to the pathogen of downy mildew (under artificial infection). It is also field resistant to phomopsis, fusarium and dry rot. Since 2018, the sunflower variety Belochka is included in the State Register of Breeding Achievements, approved for production in the Central Black Earth, Northern Caucasus, Middle Volga and Lower Volga regions. The originator is VNIIMK.