Guayule plant named ‘E-B2WN-13167’

Genus and species:

Variety denomination: ‘E-B2WN-13167’.

The present invention relates to a new and distinct variety of guayule, botanically known asand hereinafter referred to by the variety name ‘E-B2WN-13167’ ‘E-B2WN-13167’ originated from controlled irradiation of seeds from theUSDA germplasm line AZ-2 (PI 599675), unpatented.

In 2016, a bulk seed lot of germplasm from AZ-2 was subjected to fast neutron irradiation. The seeds were sown and plants were grown for evaluation in Applicant's research facility located in Eloy, Arizona in USDA Plant Hardiness Zone 9b. Asexual reproduction of ‘E-B2WN-13167’ was performed by the propagation of vegetative cuttings at Applicant's research facility located in Eloy, Arizona. Multiple generations have since been produced and have shown that the unique features of this cultivar are stable and reproduced true-to-type in successive generations.

The following characteristics of the new cultivar have been repeatedly observed and can be used to distinguish ‘E-B2WN-13167’ as a new and distinct cultivar ofplant.

The ‘E-B2WN-13167’ cultivar has not been observed and evaluated under all possible conditions and phenotypic differences may be observed with variations in environmental, climatic, and cultural conditions, however, without any variance in genotype.

Plants of the ‘E-B2WN-13167’ cultivar can be distinguished from the AZ-2 variety in several characteristics. For example, plants of the ‘E-B2WN-13167’ cultivar have reduced internode lengths, shorter peduncles, thicker leaves, lower numbers of flowers, and exhibit slower growth compared with the AZ-2. The ‘E-B2WN-13167’ cultivar has aborted seed production compared with the AZ-2 variety.

The following is a detailed botanical description of the ‘E-B2WN-13167’ cultivar. Observations, measurements, values, and comparisons were collected at Applicant's research facility in Eloy, Arizona, in USDA Plant Hardiness Zone 9b. Color references are to the Munsell Plant Tissue Color Charts. As can be observed from the provided figure, guayule leaves are rarely one solid color, but encompass hues, shades, tints, and color patterns.

The ‘E-B2WN-13167’ cultivar has shorter internodes resulting in higher numbers of leaves (37±3) per 10 cm branch section compared with AZ-2 (23±2). The internode length of the ‘E-B2WN-13167’ cultivar has a length of 0.6±0.23 cm on branches with 0.40 cm branch diameter and 0.72±0.26 cm on branches with 0.70 cm branch diameter, compared with the AZ-2 having an internode length of 0.70±0.25 cm on branches with 0.40 cm diameter and 1.27±0.45 cm on branches with 0.70 cm diameter.

The inflorescence of the ‘E-B2WN-13167’ cultivar have relatively short peduncles (5.01±1.66 cm) compared to other AZ-2 shrubs of the same age (17.62±3.68 cm). The ‘E-B2WN-13167’ cultivar had fewer flowers during the growing period, with a smaller flower diameter (0.65±0.02 cm) compared to the wild type (0.82±0.02 cm). The ‘E-B2WN-13167’ cultivar has a smaller leaf area (5.07±0.35 cm) compared to the AZ-2 (5.56±0.73 cm). The ‘E-B2WN-13167’ cultivar is smaller than the AZ-2, with the ‘E-B2WN-13167’ cultivar having a height of 55 cm and a width of 28 cm at two years, compared with the AZ-2 variety having a height of 105 cm and width of 96 cm at two years. In addition, the ‘E-B2WN-13167’ cultivar shows a slower rate of growth (0.06 cm/day) compared to the AZ-2 variety (0.1 cm/day). The ‘E-B2WN-13167’ cultivar has a relatively higher amount of rubber and lower biomass compared with the AZ-2 variety in the tested environment.