Evaluation of growth and yield characters in bottle gourd (Lagenaria siceraria (Mol.) Standl.)

Abstract

Investigations were carried out at Department of Horticulture, Faculty of Agriculture, Annamalai University, Annamalainagar. Twenty genotypes of bottle gourd collected from different districts of Tamil Nadu were evaluated during the year 2016-2017. These genotypes were used to assess the variability, heritability, genetic advance, relationship of yield components with yield and their interdependence, direct and indirect effects of yield attributes on yield per plant and genetic diversity. For this programme, morphological characters like vine length, days to first male flowering, days to first female flowering, node number of first male flower, node number of first female flower, days to first fruit harvest, fruit length, fruit girth, average fruit weight, number of fruits per vine, 100 seed weight and yield per vine were studied. Analysis of variance revealed that there were significant differences among the genotypes studied for all the characters except node number of first male flower. On the basis of mean performance, among 20 genotypes LS12 was identified as the best genotypes as it has recorded higher mean values for six out of twelve characters studied.