Comparison of diversity in flowering rate of two saffron (Crocus sativus) populations of Iran

The economical value of saffron stems in its flower stigmas. As a result, the yield has high relation to the number of flowers. Inbreeding of saffron is very difficult because of its sterility and environmental effects. The purpose of this study is to investigate the diversity in flowering rate. Corms of saffron were collected from two regions of Gonabad and Ghaen and classified on the basis of corin weight. The number of flowers evaluated as five traits: without flower, one, two, three and more than three flowers. Several rows and three sets of ten samples from each class were randomly selected and the number of flowers in each plant was counted. The results of this study showed that the Ghaen population has higher flower mean than that of Gonabad population. Also the 10-g weight corms of Gonabad and 7 g of Ghaen had the highest number of flowers and also the least number of plants without flower. Cluster analysis was done by mean of data and Ward method. The populations were classified into three groups: 3, 4, 5, 6 and 7-g corms of Gonabad were located in the first cluster; 3, 4, 5 and 6-g corms of Gonabad with 8 and 9-gram corms of Ghaen in the second cluster; and 10-g corms of Gonabad with 7-g corms of Ghaen in the third cluster indicating that there is no difference for flowering inside each group but there is significant difference between groups.