Construction of Heterotic Populations in Baby Corn Zea Mays L

Abstract

The main objective of the present investigation is to estimate variability between two newlinediverse heterotic populations, identification of transgressive segregants for baby corn traits, to newlineassess the consistency of combining ability and to develop potential inbred lines and hybrids newlinesuitable for baby corn production by using reciprocal recurrent selection. newlineCombining ability analysis was carried out in F4, F5 and F6 generations of both the newlinePopulations A (PDM 53 × PDM 4441) and B (HKI 323 × HKI 1105) following L × T design. newlineThe consistency in combining ability status of early generation families was worked out and newlinesuperior early transgressive families for important baby corn traits namely baby corn yield per newlinese, prolificacy, earliness etc., were identified. newlineThe potential crosses, P32 × H41, P40 × H41 and P14 × H41 was emerged as potential newlinetransgressive segregants for babycorn yield across generations (F5 and F6). These crosses were newlinefurther tested in multi-location trails for their stability and production efficiency for baby corn newlinetraits. newlineBased on pooled weighted gca scores using eight important baby corn traits analysed newlineacross F4, F5 and F6 generations in population A (PDM53 × PDM4441) as well as in newlinepopulation B (HKI 323 × HKI 1105), for consistency in the combining ability (gca effects) newlineand per se performance, the outcome of the research work conclusively revealed that the line newlineP14 corresponding to Population A was found to be the best inbred line and the inbred lines newlineH57 and H41 corresponding to Population B were found to be the best inbred lines in baby newlinecorn breeding. In future, these lines viz., P14 (population A), H57 and H41 (Population B) newlinefind major significance in baby corn breeding to be preferentially used as one of the parents in newlinehybridization program to develop new potential single cross hybrids suited for baby corn newlinecultivation.