CHARACTER ASSOCIATION AND DIVERSITY ANALYSIS OF OKRA (Abelmoschus esculentus L. Moench)

Abstract

A field experiment was conducted at the experimental farm of Sher-e-Bangla Agricultural University with twenty eight Okra (Abelmoschus esculentus L. Monech) genotypes during ‘Kharif’ season (March 2017 to July 2017).Eleven characters were studied to find out the genetic variability, heritability and genetic advance, correlation coefficient analysis, path coefficient analysis and genetic divergence. The genotypes varied significantly (p< 0.01) for all of the characters studied. High genotypic and phenotypic coefficient of variation were observed for primary branches (43.91 and 33.64) and fruit yield per plant (37.51 and 32.48). Accordingly high heritability accompanied with high genetic advance in percent of mean observed in plant height (97.32 and 29.98), number of fruits per plant (88.55 and 50.44), fruit yield per plant (74.99 and 57.94), seed per fruit (73.02 and 34.00) and primary branches (58.70 and 53.10) suggested that these characters would be considered for varietal selection. The correlation studies revealed that fruit yield per plant showed significant positive correlation with number. of average fruit weight (0.569 and 0.629) number of fruit per plant (0.879 and 0.796), plant height (0.699 and 0.618) and significantly negative correlation with seed per fruit (-0.021 and -0.065) at genotypic and phenotypic level. These characters would be considered when selection a good variety. Path analysis revealed days to 50% flowering (0.0070), plant height (0.370), number of fruits per plant (0.7560), average fruit weight (0.5380) had direct positive effect on pod yield per plant, indicating these traits are the main contributors to fruit yield per plant. The studied genotypes were clustered into five groups with highest of inter-cluster distance between clusters I and V (20.07).This indicates diverse genotypes from these two clusters, if involved in hybridization may produce a wide spectrum of segregating population while the lowest inter-cluster distance was observed between cluster II and IV (5.34). The greater divergence in the genotypes due to different morph genic characters would offer a great scope in okra breeding.