Breeding a New Apple Cultivar, ‘HFF60’: Its Breeding Process and Characteristics

The yellow-skin and red-fleshed apple cultivar ‘HFF60’ was bred on Fujisaki Experimental Farm of Hirosaki University. The potential parents of the cultivar elucidated by SSR markers are ‘Toko’ and “red-fleshed apple strain Parent A”, respectively. The shoot growth of ‘HFF60’ is vigorous like ‘Ohrin’; suitable training and pruning techniques were necessary to maintain a sufficient number of flower buds. In the Aomori region, the harvest season of this cultivar was from late September to early October. The cylindrical fruit usually had a fresh weight of 350 g with 12.4% soluble solids and around 0.5% titratable acidity at harvest. The flesh firmness readily decreased during the cold storage period and 1-MCP treatment could not prevent it. Pre-harvest AVG treatment was effective for maintaining the flesh firmness but it cannot be practically applied because of inhibiting flesh coloration. Thus, ‘HFF60’ was not suitable for long storage, but it has the attractive advantage that both growers and consumers can easily evaluate the flesh coloration non-destructively through the yellowish permeable skin. In order to promote this cultivar, we could emphasize not only the color contrast between skin and flesh for fresh consumption, but also highlight the utility for processing consumption.