2007 Annual Report 1a.Objectives (from AD-416) Produce sugarcane seed of recommended crosses of clones from Louisiana, Texas and Florida for the ARS Louisiana sugarcane Breeding Program. 1b.Approach (from AD-416) Sugarcane clones will be imported from Louisiana, quarantined and tested for pathogens of leaf scald, ratoon stunt, yellow leaf and mosaic. Subsequently, the disease-free clones will be released and incorporated into the breeding population for crossing. The plants will be grown under conditions to maximize flowering by manipulating light treatments using photoperiod and light delay treatments. Recommended crosses will be made using female tassels pollinated with male tassels by maintaining plants on either photoperiod carts or on rail carts that are moved into heated structures at night to prevent emasculation by cold temperatures. After crosses are made the pollinated tassels will be held for seed set and the mature seed will be harvested and sent to the ARS program in Louisiana. 3.Progress Report This serves to document research conducted under a trust fund between ARS and the American Sugar Cane League, Inc. Additional details of research can be found in the report for the parent project 6625-13210-002-00D, “Enhancement of Sugarcane Germplasm for Development of Cultivars and Sustainable Production”. In the 2006/2007 crossing season we made 638 crosses using 1271 female tassels to produce 400,045 seeds for the Louisiana ARS breeding program in Houma. An additional 128 crosses using 254 female tassels to produce an estimated 39,211 seeds were made and shared with either the ARS Florida program or the Texas A&M breeding program. Included are seed produced for the sugarcane borer resistance recurrent selection program. This relates to Objective 1 of the parent project “Develop breeding methods related to manipulation and synchronization of flowering and storage of pollen to produce seed with a wide range of diversity for use in breeding programs in Florida, Louisiana, Texas, and California.” Progress was monitored during the two weeks that scientists and support personnel from USDA-ARS at Houma, LA spent at USDA-ARS Canal Point, FL making crosses for Louisiana. In addition, there were several emails and phone calls between scientists at Houma and Canal Point to decide on parent genotypes to be used for Louisiana and to identify genotypes not currently at Canal Point that needed to be imported.