Black Currant (Ribes nigrum) VIKTOR

Blackcurrant 'Viktor' (syn. Bri 9504-5)

'Viktor' is a modern, highly productive blackcurrant variety resulting from a successful international breeding program. It stands out primarily for its late ripening, very large fruits with good taste, and exceptionally high vitamin C content.

Blackcurrant 'Viktor'

Thanks to its resistance to diseases and pests, it represents an excellent choice for both commercial plantations and home gardens.

Main advantages of the variety:

• Extremely high vitamin C content (almost 194 mg/100 g).
• Large to very large fruits with good taste.
• High yield.
• Very good resistance to fungal and viral diseases.
• Upright habit (facilitates harvesting and maintenance).
• Good separation of berries from the stem.

Origin and Breeding

• Origin: Lithuania. The variety is the result of a joint international breeding program (1995-2001) involving institutes from Sweden, Lithuania, Latvia, and Russia.
• Breeder: Lithuanian Institute of Horticulture (Lietuvos agrarinių ir miškų mokslų centro filialas Sodininkystės ir daržininkystės institutas, Babtai).
• Crossing: Created by crossing the hybrid '65-59-5' and the Swedish variety 'Storklas'. During testing, it carried the designation Bri 9504-5.
• Registration: The variety passed official DUS tests (Distinctness, Uniformity, Stability) at the Polish institute COBORU in 2013-2016.

Detailed variety description: Bush and Growth

• Vigor: Medium.
• Habit: Upright. Forms a medium number of skeletal (basal) shoots.
• Shoots: One-year-old shoots are greyish with medium to strong anthocyanin (reddish) coloration.
• Buds: Vegetative buds are long, with a narrow and sharp apex, slightly standing out from the shoot. They have medium anthocyanin coloration and a weak wax coating.
• Leaves: The leaf blade is medium long to long and wide. The leaf base is slightly open. The upper side of the leaf has a medium to dark green color with medium gloss. The petiole has weak anthocyanin coloration.
• Flowering: Flowers in the mid-season. Inflorescences are long and contain many flowers (more than 4 in the leaf axil).

Fruits (Berries) and Chemical Composition

• Size: Large to very large.
• Color: Black with medium gloss.
• Strigs: Medium long (panicle type). The berries are characterized by good (easy) separation from the stem.
• Taste: Good.
• Chemical composition (Health benefits): The 'Viktor' variety stands out with the highest vitamin C (ascorbic acid) content among all evaluated hybrids in the study, reaching 193.8 mg/100 g. It also contains 14.9% soluble solids (Brix), 3.4% titratable acids, 267.0 mg/100 g of phenols, and 98.3 mg/100 g of anthocyanins.

Cultivation properties and characteristics

• Phenology:
  • Ripening: Late ripening variety. Harvesting begins in the early to medium period within late varieties.
  • Yield: High productivity. In tests in Lithuania, this variety showed the highest productivity among the evaluated hybrids.
• Resistance and requirements:
  • Diseases: Characterized by very good resistance to leaf spots (e.g., Drepanopeziza ribis), rust, and blackcurrant reversion virus.
  • Pests: Was not damaged by the blackcurrant gall mite in tests.
  • Frost resistance: Showed good adaptability to climatic conditions in tests.

Drawbacks of the variety:

• No obvious cultivation drawbacks emerge from the available materials. (A lower anthocyanin content compared to some other hybrids in the study is compensated by a record vitamin C content).