Department of Plant Breeding, Punjab Agricultural University, Ludhiana
Online published on 25 January, 2012.
Correlations and path coefficients were computed for pod yield, various yield influencing characters, oil content and protein content in F3 progenies of two groundnut crosses. Pod yield was closely associated with number of mature pods and number of secondary branches in cross 1 (semi-spreading × bunch). However, in cross 2 (semi-spreading × semi-spreading) in addition to pod number and number of secondary branches, yield was also correlated with number of primary branches and length of primary and secondary branches. ‘ The path analysis revealed that in both the crosses large direct contribution to pod yield was only of number of mature pods, whereas the contribution of the other characters was largely indirect through pod number. Non-significant association of oil content and protein content with almost all other characters indicated that these traits cannot be improved by indirect selection through any of the other characters studied and the improvement for oil or protein content will not have any adverse affect on pod yield.
