Diallel Analysis over Environments in Wheat-Plant Characters and Harvest Index

The present investigation was under-taken on a diallel cross of eleven varietics of bread wheat grown over three environments in respect of plant height, ear length, peduncle length, number of spikelets per spike and harvest index. Analysis of variance indicated highly significant differences among the progenies for all the characters. Combining ability analysis showed that mean squares due both to general and specific combining ability were highly significant, the former being much larger in magnitude than that of the latter. However, the ratio s²gca/s^asva was less than unity in all cases. The estimates of the general combining ability effects indicated that ‘Sonalika’ was the besi general combiner for ear length and peduncle length, ‘HD 2009’ for peduncle length. ‘WL410’ for peduncle length and spikelets per spike, ‘HD 1981’ for harvest index and ‘UP 368’ and ‘HD 217V’ for dwarfness. From among the crosses it was not possible to isolate any one with optimum constellation of characters.