Studies on Heterosis for Yield and its Component Traits in Brinjal (Solanum melongena L.)

Abstract

A field trial was conducted to estimate the magnitude of heterosis in brinjal, for twenty-two characters, during Rabi 2021 at the Main Experiment Station, Department of Vegetable Science, Acharya Narendra Deva University of Agriculture and Technology, Ayodhya, Uttar Pradesh. 8 parental lines and the 28 F1 hybrids obtained from the parental lines following half-diallel mating design, along with a standard variety, Pant Samrat were evaluated in randomized block design with three replications. Observations were recorded on twenty-two characters viz. days to 50% flowering, days to first fruit harvest, leaf area (cm²), plant height (cm), number of primary branches per plant length of fruit (cm), fruit diameter (cm), fruit length/circumference ratio, length of peduncle (cm), length of calyx (cm), number of fruits per cluster, number of fruits per plant, average fruit weight (g), fruit yield per plant (kg), crop duration, dry matter content (%), TSS (%), total phenol content (mg/100g), reducing sugars (%), non-reducing sugar (%), total sugars (%) and ascorbic acid content (mg/100g). The study revealed that significant heterobeltiosis and standard heterosis were observed for all the characters under study. The crosses P2 x P4 (42.42% and 25.12%) and P1 x P4 (41.73% and 14.15%) exhibited considerable heterosis over the better parent and the standard variety respectively, which may be commercially exploited for cultivation under sodic soils due to their high yield and desirable fruit qualities.