GENETIC VARIABILITY AND CHARACTER ASSOCIATION IN CHICK PEA (Cicer arietinum L)

Abstract

An experiment was conducted to study genetic variability, character association, genetic divergence and path coefficient analysis for yield and yield contributing traits in chick pea. The study was carried out at the experimental farm, Department of Genetics and Plant Breeding, Sher-e-Bangla Agricultural University, Dhaka, during October 2008 to April 2009. The results indicated that different chick pea genotypes differed significantly regarding all the characters studied. Minimum differences of genotypic and phenotypic variances and coefficient of variation as well as high heritability coupled with high genetic advance and genetic advanced in percent of mean were observed for all the traits of different chick pea genotypes indicated additive gene effects of these traits. Number of pods per plant and 100 seeds weight of different genotypes had a high degree of significant positive association with seed yield per plant and high positive direct effect indicated that these characters had the major contribution towards the grain yield per hill. Selection could be made based on two traits for the improvement of yield of chick pea. Cluster H comprised maximum number of (11) genotypes followed by cluster Ill, V. IV and 1. The highest inter genotypic distance was observed between the genotype BD 6549 and 130 6603 (2.09). The inter cluster distance was maximum between the clusters I and Il (16.35). Among the characters number of secondary branches (0.11) and seed yield per plant (0.01) were major characters that contributed mostly toward genetic divergence.