Genetic variability and character association in late sown wheat genotypes

Abstract

Bread wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) is considered as one of the most important cereal crop in the World and fundamental to human cultivation. Development of high yielding genotypes is the focal objective of any wheat breeding programme. Identification of superior genotypes with desirable traits and their consequent use in breeding program and establishment of successful selection criteria can be helpful for successful varietal improvement. The experiment was carried out with 24 wheat genotypes to estimate the genetic variability and association of characters among different genotypes of wheat. Findings indicated that narrow difference was present in respect to GCV and PCV among all the traits which suggested little environmental influence for the expression of different traits in wheat. All the traits showed high heritability. The characters namely plant height, tillers per sq.m, spike length, grains per spike, total chlorophyll content total biomass and harvest index were likely to be governed by additive gene action and early generation of selection would be helpful for improvement of such traits. Out of ten yield attributed components, only harvest index was correlated positively and significantly with grain yield/plant (rP = 0.526; rG = 0.530). Path coefficient analysis revealed that the magnitude of positive direct effect on grain yield per plant was highest through harvest index (1.496 for phenotypic path &1.50 for genotypic path) and biomass content (1.29 for both genotypic and phenotypic path) on grain yield per plant. The present analyses confirmed that harvest index and biomass content emerged as the most important selection indices for enhancing grain yield of wheat.