Summary

To investigate the genetic regulation of postharvest flower longevity in Asiatic hybrid lilies (Lilium L.), 10 cultivars and 45 progenies were forced, harvested and evaluated under standardised conditions in growth chambers. Ana-lysis of variance for individual flower longevity indicated highly significant (p < 0.001) variation among parents, among progenies and among descendants within progenies. High broad-sense heritability (0.79) calculated at the individual plant level indicated that selection for long individual flower longevity can be expected to be very effective. General combining ability (GCA) effects were highly significant (p < 0.001), and the estimated narrow-sense heritability was high (0.74). Therefore, individual flower longevity of a genotype can be used as an indication for its breeding value. Although deviating results can be expected as specific combining ability (SCA) effects were also significant (p = 0.046). Small, but significant correlations between individual flower longevity and other plant characters were found. The impact of these correlations on the selection efficiency for improved postharvest performance of lily inflorescences is discussed