Helenium Salsa Cultivar Compact Habit Stable Flowering
Find Innovative SolutionsGenerate Solutions
Solution Overview
Problem
There is a need for new compact Helenium plants with attractive ray and disc colors that can reproduce stably and consistently under varying environmental conditions, as existing cultivars may not maintain their unique features across different temperature, daylength, and light intensity variations.
Innovation Solution
A new cultivar, 'Salsa', derived from open-pollination of Helenium hybrida 'Ruby Tuesday' with an unknown male parent, exhibiting a compact, upright growth habit, dark red-colored ray florets with yellow bases, strong peduncles, and a freely flowering habit, which is stable through asexual reproduction by terminal cuttings.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If existing Helenium cultivars are grown under varying environmental conditions, then their growth and flowering may be affected, but their unique features and colors may not be maintained stably
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies parameter changes by selecting and breeding plants with specific genetic parameters that result in stable phenotype expression. The 'Salsa' cultivar was selected from open-pollination progeny of 'Ruby Tuesday' and exhibits consistent growth habits, flower colors, and flowering patterns across different environmental conditions, indicating that genetic parameter selection has been optimized for stability.
2Volume of moving object
If compact Helenium plants are developed through breeding, then plant size is reduced, but maintaining vigorous growth and freely flowering habit becomes challenging
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies local quality by concentrating vigor and flowering capacity in specific regions of the plant architecture. The 'Salsa' cultivar maintains a compact overall size but achieves vigorous growth through strong basal branching and concentrated flowering stems. The freely flowering habit is localized to the inflorescence regions, with multiple flowers per stem compensating for reduced overall plant volume.
Data Source
AI summary
A new and distinct cultivar of Helenium plant named ‘Salsa’, characterized by its compact and upright plant habit; moderately vigorous to vigorous growth habit; freely flowering habit; inflorescences with dark red-colored ray florets with yellow-colored bases giving a “halo” effect around the disc; and strong peduncles that hold the inflorescences above the foliar plane.