I'm almost ready to sow the F2 of this cross, so I thought it might be a good time to write a bit about it in anticipation of the beautiful segregation that will happen this year! 
Ra is an accession I got from GRIN in 2014, picked because it has pale pink flowers. It's quite short, and has green pods. Haven't tasted it so I don't really have much other information other than the genetic stuff it was labelled with. It was intended to introduce the pale pink colour into my Rainbow Pea project but I got distracted by the idea of crossing it to Unity... Ra's flowers are pale pink because it combines the b allele that gives peas like Elisabeth their beautiful pink colour with the ar allele that makes flowers violet instead of the wild type maroon. arar bb makes pale pink. It's quite subtle and pretty.
Unity came from JIC and has absolutely gorgeous crimson flowers. It grows to about a metre tall and also has green pods and the seeds have a very interesting pattern of brown markings. The crimson colour comes from the cr allele.
I was really excited to find out that crossing these two peas will (hopefully) produce several flower colours that are brand new to me! So I made the cross and the F1 made me some lovely brown-marked F2 seeds for me to grow this year. Interestingly, the F1 flowers were a bit unusual in that they started out a lovely wine red colour before turning the normal maroon.
Here's what I expect from the cross:
27/64 Ar_ B_ Cr_ Purple
9/64 Ar_ B_ crcr Crimson
9/64 Ar_ bb Cr_ Pink
3/64 Ar_ bb crcr Antique Rose
9/64 arar B_ Cr_ Violet
3/64 arar B_ crcr Light Mauve
3/64 arar bb Cr_ Pale Pink
1/64 arar bb crcr I don't know what this colour will be!
I have 91 seeds so there's a very good chance I'll end up with most of the colours, but possibly not the unknown mystery 1/64 type. I'm really interested in the new antique rose and light mauve colours - mostly I made the cross just to see them, but there might be something good in there that's worth keeping...

Ra is an accession I got from GRIN in 2014, picked because it has pale pink flowers. It's quite short, and has green pods. Haven't tasted it so I don't really have much other information other than the genetic stuff it was labelled with. It was intended to introduce the pale pink colour into my Rainbow Pea project but I got distracted by the idea of crossing it to Unity... Ra's flowers are pale pink because it combines the b allele that gives peas like Elisabeth their beautiful pink colour with the ar allele that makes flowers violet instead of the wild type maroon. arar bb makes pale pink. It's quite subtle and pretty.
Unity came from JIC and has absolutely gorgeous crimson flowers. It grows to about a metre tall and also has green pods and the seeds have a very interesting pattern of brown markings. The crimson colour comes from the cr allele.
I was really excited to find out that crossing these two peas will (hopefully) produce several flower colours that are brand new to me! So I made the cross and the F1 made me some lovely brown-marked F2 seeds for me to grow this year. Interestingly, the F1 flowers were a bit unusual in that they started out a lovely wine red colour before turning the normal maroon.
Here's what I expect from the cross:
27/64 Ar_ B_ Cr_ Purple
9/64 Ar_ B_ crcr Crimson
9/64 Ar_ bb Cr_ Pink
3/64 Ar_ bb crcr Antique Rose
9/64 arar B_ Cr_ Violet
3/64 arar B_ crcr Light Mauve
3/64 arar bb Cr_ Pale Pink
1/64 arar bb crcr I don't know what this colour will be!
I have 91 seeds so there's a very good chance I'll end up with most of the colours, but possibly not the unknown mystery 1/64 type. I'm really interested in the new antique rose and light mauve colours - mostly I made the cross just to see them, but there might be something good in there that's worth keeping...
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