Department of Plant Breeding, Punjab Agricultural University, Ludhiana
Online published on 25 January, 2012.
Fifty pearl millet genotypes were evaluated for grain yield and 11 morphological and physiological traits. The path-coefficient and regression analyses revealed that tiller number was the most important character to influence grain yield. Harvest index, flag leaf area and chlorophyll b also appeared to affect grain yield substantially. The chlorophylls a and b had highly significant correlations with each other. However, most of the influence of chlorophyll a on grain yield was through chlorophyll b. The study indicates that an efficient plant type of pearl millet should possess high tillering capacity, high harvest index, large flag leaves and more amount of chlorophyll b.
