Evaluation of elite fine grain aromatic rice lines for agro-morphological traits under mid hill condition of Uttarakhand

Abstract

The present investigation was carried out to find out the yield performance and extent of genetic variability present in the fine grain aromatic rice advanced lines under mid hill conditions of Uttarakhand. Sixteen fine grain aromatic rice genotypes were evaluated for fifteen quantitative traits in a completely randomized block design with three replications during Kharif season. Highly significant differences were found for most of the traits, indicating the existence of genetic variability varying from lower to higher coefficients. The results found that the highest estimates of genotypic and phenotypic coefficient of variability for grain yield per plot (20.74% and 22.21%) whereas moderate level was observed for plant height (12.19% and 12.27%), panicles per plant (9.78% and15.19%), grains per panicle (11.40% and12.05%) and fertile grains per panicle (11.74% and 12.29%) respectively, indicating considerable amount of variability expressed for these traits. High heritability as well as high genetic advance was exhibited by traits viz., plant height (97.71% and 29.05%), number of grains per panicle (89.49% and 27.81%) and fertile grains per panicle (91.23% and 22.98%) signifying that for the improvement of these traits selection may be rewarding. Grain yield was observed to be significantly and positively correlated with plant height (0.467), flag leaf length (0.389), thousand grain weights (0.523) and kernel length (0.322) suggesting the scope of these traits for improving yield of fine grain aromatic rice through indirect selection. The path coefficient analysis showed that kernel length (1.675) had the highest positive direct effect on grain yield followed by days to maturity (1.053), grains per panicle (0.585), thousand grain weight (0.501), panicles per plant (0.305) and plant height (0.285). Therefore, these traits should be considered as significant while formulating the selection criteria in fine grain aromatic rice breeding for yield under the mid hill conditions of Uttarakhand.