Genetic divergence and stability analysis in Pigeonpea (Cajanus cajan L.)

• Main Author: Ch.Sreelakshmi, D.Shivani and C.V.Sameer Kumar
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Indian Society of Plant Breeders 2010-07-01
• Series: Electronic Journal of Plant Breeding
• Subjects: Genetic divergence; stability; Pigeonpea
• Online Access: http://sites.google.com/site/ejpb10/vol-1-4-3/Vol-1-4-530-535.pdf?attredirects=0

Thirty Pigeonpea genotypes studied for genetic divergence using Mahalanobis D2 statistic indicated wider genetic diversity.Considerable variability was observed for days to 50% flowering, days to maturity, plant height, number of pods per plantand seed yield due to non-linear pooled deviation. The variability was low for number of primary branches per plant and testweight. Among the 7 characters studied, seed yield contributed the most (89.49%) towards the divergence of genotypesfollowed by number of pods per plant, days to 50% flowering and plant height. The genotypes were grouped into 8 clusters,maximum inter cluster distance being observed between the clusters III and VII (725.69). Hence, crossing of parents fromthese clusters would be desirable for combining earliness, short plant height, more primary branches per plant with more podnumber coupled with high seed yield. The genotypes ICPL 98008, ICPHAL 4979-2 and ICP 77303 were identified asdesirable and stable for days to maturity. Stability parameters along with per se performance across three kharif seasonsrevealed that ICPL 20036 and ICPL 20058 were stable genotypes for seed yield and were found to be suitable for low inputcultivation while, ICPL 13198 was found suitable for input rich cultivation.