Combing ability over environments for grain yield and its related traits in pearl millet

Combining ability for grain yield and its components in pearl millet was studied over three environments (seasons) in a set of five females, 10 males and their resultant F₁’s with check hybrid MH 169. The pooled analysis showed that both GCA and SCA variances were highly influenced by the environments implying that the parents and crosses must be evaluated over a wide range of environments to have unbiased estimates. The analysis of variance indicated preponderance of additive type of gene action in the expression of ear head length and ear head girth, while non-additive gene action was observed to be more important for number of effective tillers per plant, ear head weight, 1000-seed weight, harvest index, threshing index, fodder yield per plant, grain yield per plant and protein content. Two female parents (ICMA 94555 and 81A) and four male parents (J 2372, J 2340, J 2440 and J 2454) had significant and positive effect for grain yield per plant. Fourteen crosses were found to be good specific combiners for grain yield with maximum SCA effect in cross ICMA 95222 x J 2372.