Study of correlation and path analysis of finger millet genotypes (Eleusine coracana L. Gaertn)

Abstract

The present investigation was conducted during Kharif, 2017-18 at the Instructional Farm, College of Agriculture, Junagadh Agricultural University with 30 different genotypes of finger millet. Observations were recorded for growth, yield and seed quality parameters accordingly, phenotypic and genotypic correlation coefficients of all the characters were worked-out as per Al-Jibouri et al. (1958). Biological yield per plant, number of fingers per ear, number of leaves on main tiller and 1000 seed weight, grain yield per plant. The data was utilized for estimation of correlation coefficients. Grain weight per main ear (rg=0.847, rp=0.831), harvest index (rg=0.883, rp=0.697), number of productive tillers per plant (rg=0.795, rp=0.685), biological yield per plant (rg=0.463, rp=0.434) and panicle length (rg=0.318, rp=0.294) positive association towards grain yield per plant at phenotypic and genotypic level. These traits could be considered for grain yield selection. Path coefficient analysis revealed that grain weight per main ear (0.534) had the highest direct positive effect towards the grain yield followed by number of productive tillers per plant (0.353), panicle length (0.166), days to flowering (0.133), harvest index (0.124), biological yield per plant (0.081), leaf blade length (0.011). The characters identified above merit due consideration in formulating effective selection strategy in finger millet for developing high yielding varieties.