Assessment of genetic variability in tuberose (Polianthes tuberosa L.) cultivars

Abstract

An experiment was carried out in the Experimental Farm, Department of Horticulture, Assam Agricultural University, Jorhat during 2016-17 and 2017-18, to study the variability in genetic parameters. The experiment was laid out with eighteen tuberose cultivars in Randomized Block Design (RBD) with three replications. Observations were recorded for growth, flower and physiological characters. The estimates of PCV and GCV were very close for yield of floret per spike, yield of floret per m2, floret weight, moisture content, fresh weight of spike, diameter of rachis, vase life of spike, vase life of floret, weight of clump, size of bulb, days to spike emergence, days to opening of first pair of floret, which were also reflected in their respective high heritability estimates. That means there is considerably high genetic variation and environment effect is less for these characters. Yield of florets per spike, yield of florets per m2 and floret weight exhibited high heritability and high genetic advance. So these characters are predominantly controlled by additive gene.