b'PARTNER CONTENTEmbracing Technology toBreed Better Pulses By Jaenet ter Schure, Pulse Breeder, Limagrain Cereals Research CanadaI ts amazing how quickly new technologies come along and makeEurope and in other crops such as maize for decades. The quicker a huge impact. we can bring new high-value varieties to farmers, the better, so When I first started working in the seed industry in 2021, wewere looking at ways of using technology to shave years off the would manually pick all the green peas from a bag of seed. It wasdevelopment pipeline. labor intensive and time consuming. Now I work with a color sorterFor one, were relying on the greenhouse much more, which that automatically separates green peas from yellow peas. In justallow us to extend the development season into winter, spread out three years, a process that was once slow and tedious is now super- labor, have more cycles throughout the year, and make selections efficient and 99 percent accurate thanks to advances in technology.indoors before validating them in the field, and therefore generally In 2022, Limagrain partnered with Saskatchewan Pulse Growersspeed up the process. to start a brand-new pea and lentil breeding program in Saskatoon,Secondly, a winter season is critical because the multiplica-Saskatchewan. This new farmer-driven breeding collaborationtion rate in peas and lentils is relatively low. One pea plant can attracted new investment, expertise, and capacity to pea and lentilgive around 40 seeds and a lentil about 100 seeds. This creates a breeding in Western Canada and brings together two farmer-ledbottleneck by having too few seeds for multi-location testing. This organizations. can be overcome by increasing the seeds during the winter season Since we kicked off our pulse breeding program at Limagrainso we can test the performance of the new varieties in multiple Cereals Research Canada in 2022, weve worked closely withlocations the following year. We also make use of a contra season Saskatchewan Pulse Growers to align our breeding priorities withfor seed production, so we can hand over breeder seed for new the needs of farmers. When I walk a plot with a pulse producer,varieties to seed companies faster.one of my first questions is always, what traits do you want me toThirdly, genomic selection is relatively new for pulses, but breed for?other Limagrain breeders have doing it for years and we can lean Yield improvement is top of the list, but root rot resistanceheavily on the know-how developed on those larger crops within is also critical and one of my main goals is to breed resistantLimagrain to benefit our pulse breeding program. That will include varieties, especially to Aphanomyces, which can stay in the soilusing genomic tools to predict and track new quantitative trait loci for up to 10-20+ years and have a profound impact on yields. In(QTLs). Genomic selection is already routine in wheat and its going Saskatchewan, where farmers like to include a pulse in a three- orto be huge for pulses. Weve already started doing some marker four-year rotation, thats a big deal. Other priorities include devel- selection, which will help us predict pea and lentil selections and oping a new herbicide tolerance system for lentils and breedingcrosses before they hit the fields. Having the markers for root rots pea varieties with less seed coat breakage.allows us to select for resistance earlier and speed up our whole Thankfully, we are part of Limagrain, a global seed company,breeding cycle even more, facilitating the roll out of new high-value which means we benefit from research theyve been conducting inseed varieties to farmers much more quickly.JANUARY 2025 SEEDWORLD.COM/CANADA 11'