Evaluation of three chemical hybridising agents on two varieties of broad beans (Vicia faba L.)

Chemical hybridizing agents (CHAs) offer opportunity to develop hybrids in crops where cytoplasmic, genetic male sterile lines are not available. Keeping this in view, three CHAs namely, benzotriazole, ethrel and surf excel (synthetic detergent) of different concentrations at three stages of development were tested on two genotypes of broad beans (Vicia taba L.) ILB 1817 and ILB 4189. The field trials were conducted following randomized block design with three replicates during 2000 and 2001. Ethrel at 0.1, 0.2 and 0.3% gave the best performance in inducing 100% male sterility lasting for 15–25 days in both the varieties. On the other hand, three treatments of benzotriazole at 0.5, 1.0 and 1.5% and three treatments of surf excel at 1.0, 2.0 and 3.0% also induced 100% male sterility lasting for 15–25 and 15–20 days respectively and surf excel proved to be the least phytotoxic in both the genotypes. The variously treated plants exhibiting 100% pollen sterility showed insignificant reduction in the total yield in open pollinated plants.