Performance of Diallel Crosses and Second Generation Synthetics of Alfalfa Derived from Partly Inbred Parents. II. Earlines and Mortality1

Publisher Website
Google Scholar
Abstract
In an alfalfa (Medicago sativa L.) breeding study conducted under conditions of high competition between plants, combining ability for earliness and mortality was evaluated from diallel crosses among selected parents, which had been partly inbred by selfing. The performance of first and second generation synthetics was also studied. For both earliness and mortality (percentage of blooming or dead plants, respectively), general combining ability (GCA) was considerably larger than specific combining ability (SCA) for all generations of parental inbreeding (S0, S1, S2, S3, and S4). GCA and SCA increased with the level of inbreeding. Significant correlations were noted between earliness and yield, between mortality and yield and between earliness and persistence. At each level of parental inbreeding the single crosses with the greatest forage yield were also the earliest and the most persistent. Syn 2 generation synthetics had the same response pattern.

This publication has 0 references indexed in Scilit: