SUDIES ON ESTIMATES OF GENETIC VARIABILITY AND CHARACTER ASSOCIATION OF YIELLD COMPONENTS AND PROTEIN CONTENT IN PEARLMILLET
Rakesh choudhary, babu lal jat,1 r.anwala,2 s.r.dhikwal3 AND k.c. sharma
Department of Plant Breeding & Genetics, SKN College of Agriculture, Jobner-Jaipur, Rajasthan,India
1 Department of Plant Breeding and Genetics College of Agriculture, Bikaner Rajasthan, India
2Department of Soil Science College of Agriculture, Bikaner Rajasthan, India
3 Department of Agronomy College of Agriculture, Bikaner Rajasthan, India
(E-mail: babu_agrotech@yahoo.co.in)
(Received: 29 December, 2012, Accepted: 23 July, 2013)
SUMMARY
Fifty genotypes of pearlmillet (including 3 checks viz. Raj-171, ICTP-3616, ICTP 8203) were evaluated for genetic variability and character association between grain yield and its different morphological characters in Randomized Block Design during kharif season, 2007. The analysis of variance indicated significant variability among genotypes for all the characters studied. The association analysis revealed that grain yield per plot had significant positive correlation at phenotypic level with plant height, productive tillers per plant, ear girth, dry fodder yield per plant, test weight, harvest index and grain yield per plant. The grain yield per plant also significantly and positively associated with these traits and these traits were also associated significantly and positively among themselves. However, days to heading was negatively associated with grain yield per plot, grain yield per plant, test weight, dry fodder yield per plant, ear girth and plant height and dry fodder yield per plant also negatively associated with harvest index. suggested that in breeding programme, major emphasis should be given to plant height, productive tillers per plant, ear girth, dry fodder yield per plant, test weight and harvest index(%) as they had positive correlation coefficients with grain yield with high direct effect and they also had high genetic variability. The path analysis revealed that dry fodder yield/plant and harvest index is the major contributors towards the grain yield/plant. Hence, main emphasis should be given in breeding programme.
Key words: Genetic variability, GCV, PCV, heritability, genetic advance, character association, pearl millet