Registration of ‘Owens’ Vegetable Soybean

‘Owens’ soybean [Glycine max (L.) Merr.] (Reg. No. CV488, PI 633567), a maturity group (MG) V cultivar, was developed jointly by the Virginia State University, Agricultural Research Station and the USDA-ARS and was released on 8 May 2003 as a vegetable soybean cultivar. Developing seeds harvested at the green pod stage can be used for direct human consumption while seeds harvested at maturity may be useful for soyfood products such as roasted nuts (Mebrahtu et al., 1991; Carter and Shanmugasundaram, 1993; Konovsky et al., 1994; Rao et al., 2002). Owens was named in honor of Dr. George Washington Owens, a professor and director of the Agricultural School of Virginia State College. Owens was developed from the cross of PI 417288 × T145 in 1989 by methods compatible with the USDA guidelines for organic production (USDA-ARS, 2000; USDA-AMS, 2000). PI 417288 is a MG V vegetable-type soybean from Japan and is reported to have moderate resistance to Mexican bean beetle (Eplilachna varivestis Mulsant) defoliation (Kraemer et al., 1994). T145 is a glabrous mutant line found in Illini and maintained by the USDA at Urbana, IL (Palmer and Kilen, 1987). PI 417288 was used in the development of Asmara, Randolph, and Owens (Mebrahtu et al., 2005a, 2005b). As the only North American cultivars with PI 417288 in their pedigrees, Owens and its half sib cultivars Asmara and Randolph (Mebrahtu et al., 2005a, 2005b) increase genetic diversity in North American cultivars. The F2 through F5 generations from the hybridization of PI 417288 × T145 were advanced through single seed descent (Brim, 1966). At seed maturity, in 1994, F5 single plants were selected and threshed individually. Progenies of individual