Preliminary Study on Ornamental Taxus chinensis var. mairei Seedling Variation of Open Pollinated Plus Tree Families

A seedling trial of ornamental types of Taxus chinensis var. mairei with 6 open pollinated plus tree families was conducted in Mingxi County of Fujian province. The results showed that there were significant differences in seedling height, basal diameter, the number of first grade lateral branches and the length of the longest lateral branches among the 6 families. Seedlings of all the 6 open pollinated plus tree families performed significantly better than the CK in terms of the seedling height, basal diameter, number of first grade lateral branches and the length of the longest lateral branch indexes. It was showed that the above characteristics of Taxus chinensis var. mairei were with higher broad heritability, medium variation coefficient and higher genetic gain. It was proposed that breeding seedlings with the 6 open pollinated plus tree families could realize the purpose of genetic improvement.