CORRELATION AND PATH COEFFICIENT ANALYSIS OF YARD LONG BEAN GENOTYPES (Vigna unguiculata)

Abstract

The present study was conducted at the field under the Department of Genetics and Plant Breeding, Hajee Mohammad Danesh Science and Technology University, Dinajpur to study the correlation and path coefficient analysis of 48 yard long bean varieties during the period from November, 2011 to April, 2012. Data were recorded on days to first flowering, pod length, pods per plant, number of pod bearing nodes per plant, number of seeds per pod, 100 seed weight, seed yield per plant, days to first harvesting, length of harvesting period and pod yield per plant. The results of the experiment revealed that significant variations were present for all the characters studied. Among the yard long bean variety, YLB-8/55 showed the highest days for days to first flowering and harvesting time. The maximum pod length (56.43 cm) was found in YLB-SS and highest yield (259.00g) per plant in the variety YLB-21. Phenotypic coefficient of variation (PCV) was higher than the genotypic coefficient of variation (GCV) for all the traits. The highest genotypic (26.70%) and phenotypic (28.16%) coefficient of variations were recorded in seed yield per plant. Heritability estimates were higher for days to first flowering, pod length, number of pods per plant, seed yield per plant, days to first harvesting and pod yield per plant. High heritability coupled with high magnitude of genetic advance in percent of mean was estimated for pod length, seed yield per plant and pod yield per plant. Correlation coefficient indicated that yield per plant had highly significant and positive association with days to first flowering, pod length, number of pods per plant, number of seeds per pod and days to first harvesting. Path coefficient analysis revealed that pod length had maximum positive direct effect on yield per plant.