In animal feeding soluble dietary fibres have been considered as the main antinutritive factor. High level of soluble pentosan content (SPC) in grains of triticale, which is used greatly as a feeding cereal, decreases feed intake in chickens and piglets, hampers digestion and makes droppings very sticky resulting in inhibition of growth. Variability of SPC was assessed spectrophotometrically within the recombinants of hexaploid triticale with synthetic amphitetraploid Triticum monococcum/Secale cereale to evaluate the possibilities of selection in respect of low soluble pentosan content. Standard triticale lines LT 176/10 and LT 522/6 used in crosses as a gene recipient parents had 125% and 128% of SPC in wheat check cultivars. Surprisingly high variation in SPC of grain was found within the set of introgressive triticale lines resulting from recombination with amphitetraploids. The coefficient of variation (CV%) amounted to 24.7. Some of the studied introgressive lines of triticale had the grain SPC lower than wheat. Theses results make the breeding of low SPC triticale promising.

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