COMBINING ABILITY AND HETEROSIS FOR SEED YIELD AND IT’S ATTRIBUTES IN LINSEED (LINUM USITATISSIMUM L.)

Abstract

Fourteen parents were crossed in line × tester fashion comprising 10 lines and 4 testers to estimate combining ability and heterosis in linseed for seed yield and its components. The analysis for combining ability revealed significant mean sum of squares of both general combining ability (GCA) and specific combining ability (SCA) for all the characters which indicated the presence of both additive and non-additive gene actions. RLC-132 and R4129 was good general combiner for most of the characters including seed yield. The tester RLC-92 and Deepika was also a good general combiner for days to 50% flowering, days to maturity, plant height, 1000 seed weight, harvest index and seed yield plant-1. Crosses RLC-132 × RLC-92, R-4154 × Indira Alsi-32, R-4158 × Deepika, R-4129 × Kartika and RLC-132 × Kartika was a good specific combiner for seed yield per plant and for other yield component. The hybrid R-4154 × Indira Alsi-32 with good specific combining ability for days to maturity can be used for yield improvement in linseed. In general for yield and other yield attributing traits the promising hybrids with high heterosis were RLC-132 × RLC-92 for days to 50% flowering, 1000 seed weight and seed yield plant-1, R-2678 × Indira Alsi-32 for number of capsules plant-1 and R-2678 × Kartika for oil content. These crosses combinations could be utilized for further use in breeding programme for improvement in yield of linseed.