Combining ability for characters related to yield and earliness in bottlegourd {Laganaria siceraria (Molina.) Standl.}

Combining ability analysis was undertaken using nine parental lines and their 36 F₁ hybrids of bottle gourd obtained from half diallel for yield and its contributing characters. The mean squares due to GCA and SCA were significant for all the characters. The ratio σ²g/σ²s suggested that nonadditive gene action had greater role with inheritance of characters. Out of nine parents, UL-4 was the best general combiner as it showed high gca effect in desirable direction for most of the traits. Regarding sca effects, UL-2 x UL-4 showed highest sca effects for total fruit yield per plant and UL-2 x UL-10 for days to first harvest.