PHENOTYPIC AND GENOTYPIC VARIABILITY STUDIES ON SOME RICE GENOTYPES IN LOW LAND ECOLOGY OF NIGERSTATE, NIGERIA

Abstract

ABSTRACT

Variability has been known as a tool for any crop improvement programme. Yield improvement can be ascertained if there is enough variability existing in a population. Therefore, this study was conducted to asses morpho-agronomic variations in the lowland rice genotypes in an Alpha lattice design with three replications. The experiment was conducted at National Cereals Research Institute Badeggi and Edozhigi in 2017. Parameters such as Days to 50 % flowering, tiller number, panicle number, panicle length, panicle exertion, plant height, panicle weight and grain yield were collected. The result showed that there exists significant variability amongst the genotypes in all the parameters studied, except panicle weight. In all the yield components studied, the phenotypic coefficient was higher than the genotypic coefficient of variation. Days to 50 % flowering had high heritability (83.63). Association study revealed that positive correlation existed among some of the yield components and some of them were significant such as association between panicle number with panicle length (0.295*). Plant height (0.1506) had the highest direct contribution to the yield and the residual effect for the path analysis was a positive value (0.0291). Principal component analysis partitioned the variability into eight principal components, days to 50 % flowering (0.61) contributed highest variability in the first principal component. Five major cluster groups were identified at cophenetic percentage of 0.578. This investigation therefore, recommends that FARO 15, FARO 17, FARO 24 and Waluye which out yielded the standard checks can be used for further rice improvement programmes