PRODUCTIVITY AND NATURAL STORAGE BEHAVIOUR OF TRUE POTATO SEED PROGENIES

Abstract

Twenty True Potato Seed (IPS) progenies supplied from Tuber Crops Research Centre (TCRC) of Bangladesh Agricultural Research Institute (BAR!) were evaluated during 2000-2001 Rr their yield potential in seedling tuber generation (F 1 C0 ) at Sher-e-Bangla Agricultural University (SAl)), Dhaka. Among them only nine progenies were selected as promising and evaluated iii their first clonal generation ([-',C l ) along with a check variety, Diamant for keeping quality under natural storage condition. The selected progenies were further evaluated in field during 200 1-2002 at same location. There existed si"nilicant variation among the progenies in seedling tuber generation for important plant growth parameters. In first clonal generation, the progenies showed significant variation for all the plant growth parameters studied except number and weight of tubers hill'. Tuberlets yield h&') was found to he highly correlated with foliage coverage, plant height, number of tuberlets plani', number of tuherlets m 2 and luherlek yield (kg 111-2 ) and direct cCkct was observed with these characters towards increasing tuberlets yield. Regarding post-harvest behaviour under natural storage, small and medium sized tubers performed significantly better storage life compared to large tubers. All the progenies showed superior storage life xvii (weight loss, rottage loss, days to sprouting and shrivelling etc.) than the check variety, Diamant. Based on both productivity and post-harvest behaviour under natural storage condition, the performances of three progenies namely; HPS-36419, HPS-9/67 and HPS-364/67 were found satisfactory.