Genetic parameters of agro-morpho-physiological traits in rice (Oryza sativa L.)

To estimate genetic variability, heritability and genetic advance a study was conducted on 10 diverse parents (3 CMS lines and 7advance breeding lines) and 21 hybrids of rice. The results obtained from present investigation showed that adequate variabilityamong the parents and crosses for agro-morpho-physiological components. The magnitude of difference between PCV and GCVobserved was relatively low for all the characters viz., days to 50 % flowering, flag leaf length, flag leaf width, flag leaf area,plant height, pollen fertility, sterile spikelets per panicle, fertile spikelets per panicle, spikelets per panicle, spikelets fertility,panicle length, grain yield per plant, test weight and head rice recovery, indicating less environmental influence. All thecharacters exhibited high broad sense heritability. The high heritability along with high genetic advance were registered as percent of mean for grain yield per plant, pollen fertility (%), sterile spikelets per panicle, fertile spikelets per panicle, spikeletsfertility (%), head rice recovery (%), 1000 seed weight, spikelets per panicle. Therefore, the improvement of these traits throughselection is the most important way to achieve the genetic gain generation after generation. High heritability coupled with highgenetic advance indicates the preponderance of additive gene action and such characters could be improved through selection.