Department of Genetics and Plant Breeding, Ch.Charan Singh University, Meerut-250004
Present investigation was conducted with the objective to evaluate the genetic variability for yield contributing traits and the direct and indirect contributions of important yield components towards grain yield as well as to identify the characters of utmost importance that may be used as selection criteria in a barley breeding program. The experimental material consisted of 158 genotypes of barley. Agronomic characters recorded include plant height, number of tillers per plant, number of internodes, flag leaf area, spike length, spikelets/spike, fertile spikelets/spike, biological yield, grain yield per plant, 100-grain weight. Fertile spikelets/spike exhibited highest heritability value of 85.5% while grain yield showed minimum value of 52.4%. Grain yield correlated positively with tillers/plant, culm internodes, flag leaf area, spike length, spikelets/spike, fertile spikelets/spike and biological yield. Path coefficient analysis indicated that grain yield had a positive direct effect with spikelets/spike and fertile spikelets/spike. These traits having a positive direct effect on grain yield can be considered as a suitable selection criteria for evolving high yielding barley genotypes.
Barley, Hordeum vulgare, path analysis, heritability, genetic advance
