Studies on Combining Ability and Heterosis in Bottle gourd [Lagenaria siceraria (Mol.) Standl.] using half diallel mating System

Abstract

The present investigation entitled "Studies on combining ability and heterosis in bottle gourd [Lagenaria siceraria (Mol.) Standi.] using half diallel mating system" was undertaken to collect information on combining ability. heterosis, generation, heritability in broad sense and genetic advance in percent of mean involving 8 Parental lines viz. Pusa Naveen, Pusa Samridhi, Pusa Santusthi, Narendra Dharidar-1, Narendra Rashmi, Pant Loaki-3, Pusa Sandesh and Andromaon-6 of bottle guard and their 28 f1 hybrids at Horticultural Research Center (HRC) ofS.V.P.U.A & T, Meerut during crop seasons of summer (Zaid) 20 l3 and 2014, the experiments were laid out ii1 RJ30 with three replications having each experimental unit of single row with spacing of 3.0m x 0.5m, observations were recorded on parents and F1 's for 9 characters viz. days to open first male flower, days to open first female flower, days to first fruit picking, vine length (m), fruit length (em), fruit diameter (em), number of thlits per plant, Average fruit weight (g), fruit yield per plant (kg), the analysis of variance due to genotypes, parents, hybrids and parents vs. hybrids were found almost highly significant for all the characters, except due to parents vs. hybrids for days to open first male and female flower. Mean performance of f1s was higher than parent for days to open first female flower, vine length, number of fruits per plant, average fruit weight and fruit yield per plant. . Parents Pusa Samridhi (PI) and Narendra Dharidar-1 (P4) found good general com.biners for fruit yield and its components, crosses, Pusa Naveen (PI) x Narendra Dharidar-1 (P4), Narendra Rashmi (P5) x Pusa Sandesh (P7) and Pusa Santusthi (P3) x Pant Loaki-3 (P6) were the best crosses which showed significant sea effect for fruit yield per plant. Both additive and dominance variance were found important in the inheritance of all the traits, Genes were asymmetrical distribution among the parents with maximum proportion of dominant genes in the Inheritance of all the traits. In general the ratios of [(4DH1) 05+F/(4DH1) 0 5-F] were more than unity with positive F value for all the traits. The proportions of (h2/H2 ) showed that at least one dominant genes groups involved in the inheritance of most of the traits except vine length, number of fruits per plant and fruit yield per plant. Modrate to high heritability (h2n) along with high genetic advance in percent of mean were observed for most of the important economic traits, the result obtained indicated the great scope of heterosis breeding in bottle gourd.