Coleoptile length and plant height of modern tall and semi-dwarf European winter wheat varieties

A total of 124 recent winter wheat accessions of European origin were screened for coleoptile length and plant height. Most of the accessions (74.2%) possessed a coleoptile length ranging between 5.00 and 7.00 cm. The German varieties Ebi, Pegassos, Flair without Rht genes had a coleoptile length of 9.08, 9.43, 9.56 cm and a plant height of 97, 95 and 98 cm, respectively. The Serbian variety Pobeda possessing Rht8 had a coleoptile length of 9.14 cm and a plant height of 71 cm. The varieties possessing Rht-B1b, Rht-D1b had a significantly shorter mean coleoptile length (5.45 cm) and mean plant height (84.5 cm) than the varieties without Rht genes (7.41 and 99.6 cm). The correlation between coleoptile length and plant height was medium (r = 0.613, p < 0.01) when the calculation excluded the varieties from Central and Southern Europe. The similar plant height, but not coleoptile length of the varieties possessing different dwarfing factors enables development of novel varieties with desirable height and coleoptile length from the European winter wheat germplasm.