Vol. 11, Issue 7 (2022)

Author(s):
Kanchan Kumari Yadav, Akanksha Lakra, Sunil Kumar Verma and Kishan Kumar Sharma

Abstract:
Berseem is exclusively cultivated as a winter season fodder crop in about 2mha of land in India. In addition of being a Multicut nature crop, it is high yielding with high nutritional value crop which is why it is widely cultivated. A plausible approach towards increasing forage yield could be through enhancing the vegetative growth. The present experiment deals with inducing auto-polyploidy along with evaluation of obtained polyploids to check the polyploidy effect over the diploid counterparts. Induction of polyploidy was conducted in Berseem clover (Trifolium alexandrinum L.) genotype, Mescavi and BB 3; the effect of polyploidy was checked over their diploid counterparts. 3 different colchicine concentrations (control, 0.01, 0.02 and 0.05%) were applied to the seeds by soaking them in 3 replicates for each treatment. Stomatal observations, nucleus size along with morphological parameters were examined for polyploidy. Polyploids were evident in populations of all the 3 treatments of Mescavi. BB 3 did not show any interaction with any of the colchicine treatment. Interactions between Mescavi genotype and colchicine treatments showed significant differences on morpho-physiological parameters. Karyotypic study evident the same. Leaflet shape, size of leaf area and leaf number showed higher variation. Multifoliate leaves were obtained from resultant autopolyploids. Increased variations are seen in floral as well as seed dimensions. Seed no. and floret no. showed significant differences. Induction of polyploidy resulted in taller plants, and more branching plant^-1, showed an increase in 10 seed weight. This methodology can be further used in plant breeding programs to increase efficiency of fodder production and in selection of more superior adaptive genotypes.