Identification of most promising genotypes for varietal development in fieldpea (Pisum sativum L. var. arvense)

Abstract

The present investigation was carried out with one hundred twenty diverse genotypes with four check varieties viz., Ambika, Rachna, HUDP 15, HFP 8909 to identify most promising genotypes of fieldpea. To achieve this, data on various quantitative characters were recorded and on the basis of these data genetic variability, character association, path coefficient, mean performance of the genotypes and genetic divergence analysis were done in Augmented block design. Analysis of genetic variance revealed moderate to high level of genetic variability among all the genotypes in majority of the characters except number of primary branches per plant. Higher GCV were recorded for number of seeds per pod (30.414), seed yield per plant (28.874g), for these characters PCV were 30.460 and 28.906, respectively, indicated very less influence of environment on the expression of these characters. Correlation and Path analysis indicated that harvest index, biological yield per plant, number of seeds per pod, pod length and 100-seed weight, had true relationship with seed yield. On the basis of non-hierarchical Euclidean cluster analysis, all the genotypes were grouped into twelve distinct non-overlapping clusters in which cluster XI was found largest having twenty genotypes while cluster VI had lowest number of genotypes e.g., FP 14-81, FP 11-72, EC-507770. The highest intra cluster distance was observed within cluster VII (16.392) followed by cluster IX (10.544). The maximum (58.308) inter cluster distance was recorded between cluster IV and XII and between cluster VI and cluster XI (54.180), indicating the possibility of high heterotic effect, if the individuals from these clusters are cross bred. On the basis of mean performance, correlation and path analysis, genotypes FP 14-81, FP 11-72, FP 2009-4, FP 11-108, FP 10-108 and FP 14-30 were found as the elite genotypes which can be utilized in breeding programme for development of high yielding varieties.