Vol. 11, Issue 3 (2022)

Author(s):
Arun Kumar Verma, KP Singh, Lokendra Singh, PK Singh, Virendra Kumar, Bankey Lal and Satyendra Kumar

Abstract:
An investigation was conducted with ten diverse bottle gourd (L. siceraria) strains/cultivars, including Pusa Naveen, Pusa Santusthi, Kalyanpur Long green, KBGL-20, KBGL-14, KBGL-22, KBGL-29, NDBG-1, NDBG-121 and H-22. The study was based on fifteen characters, namely node number to first staminate flower appears, node number to first pistillate flower appears, ratio of pistillate: staminate flowers, internodal length (cm), vine length at last picking stage (m), number of primary branches per plant, days to first fruit harvest, average weight per fruit (kg), number of fruits per plant, fruit diameter (cm), fruit length (cm), duration of crop (days), total soluble solids (TSS) ⁰Brix, specific gravity of fruits (g/cc) and fruit yield per plant (kg). The result of phenotypic coefficient of variation (PCV) were higher than genotypic coefficient of variation (GCV) for all the characters and high heritability coupled with high genetic advance in percent of mean for node number to first staminate and pistillate flower appears, ratio of pistillate: staminate flowers, average weight per fruit, number of fruits per plant, fruit length in both F₁ and F₂ generations and fruit yield per plant in F_2. Indicating that most likely that heritability is due to additive gene effects and selection may be effective.