Generation Mean Analysis for Some Economic Characters in Upland Cotton

Genetic analysis of quantitative traits helps to elucidate the nature and magnitude of genetic variation present in the population. Generation mean analysis carried out to estimate the nature and magnitude of gene effects for yield and fibre quality traits in two crosses of upland cotton revealed the presence of epistasis for 2.5% span length in first cross while for boll weight, ginning out turn and 2.5% span length in second cross. This demonstrated that importance of epistasis in the inheritance of different traits cannot be ignored. The additive gene effects observed for seed cotton yield, bolls per plant and ginning out turn in cross-1 and for seed cotton yield in cross-2 may be fixed in pure lines. Additive as well as non additive gene effects operative in the inheritance of remaining traits suggested that for improving these traits, selection in the segregating generations should be delayed to later generations or sophisticated selection procedures as recurrent selection or population improvement may be followed.