Vol. 11, Issue 9 (2022)

Author(s):
Sowmya M and HL Nadaf

Abstract:
Crosses were made to develop a drought tolerant groundnut lines with bold kernel features traits using TG-76 and two drought tolerant parents (Dh-257 and Dh-256). Two F₂ cross derivatives with their parents were used to study their mean performance, genetic variability, heritability and genetic advance as percentage of mean for yield and contributing characters. Among the two crosses, the cross Dh-257 × TG-76 had higher mean performance for test weight and shelling per cent and can be used as best cross combination for improving bold kernel types. The variability parameters revealed that the phenotypic coefficient of variation was higher than genotypic coefficient of variation for all the characters studied indicating the role of environmental variance in the total variance. Phenotypic coefficients of variance (PCV) and genotypic coefficients of variance (GCV) for important yield contributing characters such as primary branches per plant, pod yield per plant, number of pods per plant, kernel yield per plant, test weight and shelling per cent in F₂ generations were higher in magnitude and displayed high heritability along with high GAM in both crosses. It suggests that all the six characters are conferred by additive gene action and these characters could be improved through simple selection in earlier generations.