Agronomic performance of lentil accessions in lentil growing areas of Bangladesh

Development of high yielding and stable varieties of lentil is a key researchable issue in Bangladesh. In this endeavour, 110 lentil accessions were evaluated during 2006–07 and 2007–08 cropping seasons at Ishurdi and Magura, two representative lentil growing areas in Bangladesh. The analysis of variance showed highly significant differences among genotypes, environments and genotype environments, thus indicating substantial variability among genotypes for days to first Dowering, days to maturity, number of pods per plant and seed yield per plot. Among four environments, Ishurdi 2006–07 was the most fuvorable and Magma 2006–07 was the least yielding. Biplot analysis provided information on wide and specific adaptation. Accessions ILL7656, ILL2532, N1M-134, 40-50134-5, ILL.8605-2 and ILL2581 exhibited higher mean seed yield and performed stability across environments. Accession ILL5150 was the best performer for Ishurdi region and accession ILL4605 was the best performer for Magura region. Considering yield potential, early maturity and wider/specific adaptability, four accessions namely ILL5150, ILL2532, ILL7656 and ILL4605 were identified as the best performer and BLx98006-3 was the earliest. These precious accessions may serve as key donms as parents for use in breeding programmes to develop high yielding varieties or may be used directly as varieties for commercial cultivation in Bangladesh.