Abstract: Crossbreeding is a valuable method for producing new plant varieties with desirable
characters. So far，this traditional method is still the major approach for breeding new Paeonia varieties.
This paper reviewed the progress in Paeonia crossbreeding program. The typical achievements via
intrasectional crossing mainly include“Lutea Hybrids”，“P. lactiflora Group”and“Herbaceous Hybrids”，
while“Itoh Hybrids”represents the achievement of intersectional crossing. These distinctive genotypes
were mainly developed by breeders from Europe，America and Japan. In comparison，only limited
achievement was obtained by Chinese breeders. To promote future Paeonia crossbreeding program in
China, we suggested more efforts be made in the five fields，i.e.，protection of wild germplasm resources，
introduction of elite genotype，efficient selection of parental combination，in-depth study on mechanism of
crossing barrier and consistent performance of crossing experiments.

Key words: Paeonia L., intrasectional crossing, intersectional crossing, breeding