2 research outputs found
Prospects of new chickpea varieties in Andhra Pradesh
Andhra Pradesh is an important chickpea growing state in
southern India, with spectacular increase in chickpea area
from 120,000 ha in 1997/98 to 638,000 ha in 2007/08. The
chickpea revolution in Andhra Pradesh has improved the prospects
of many resource-poor, small land holding and rainfed
farmers of Andhra Pradesh. However, the growing season of
chickpea in Andhra Pradesh is warm and short (90-110 days),
and drought is the foremost factor responsible for significant
yield losses. Rainfall in major chickpea-growing regions is quite
uncertain and erratic, resulting in poor yields. The Regional Agricultural
Research Station of Acharya N G Ranga Agricultural
University, Nandyal, Andhra Pradesh, India is the lead centre
responsible for location-specific research in chickpea in Andhra
Pradesh. With support from ICRISAT and ICAR, the centre has
initiated crop improvement programmes during 2004 and has
released four promising chickpea varieties for commercial cultivation.
Three desi varieties viz., Nandyal Sanaga 1(NBeG 3),
Dheera (NBeG 47), and Nandyal Gram 49 (NBeG 49) released
for Andhra Pradesh and one large-seeded kabuli Nandyal Gram
119 (NBeG 119) released for the southern zone comprising
Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu, are cutting across
chickpea growing regions of Andhra Pradesh. Nandyal Sanaga
1, released in 2012, is a bold-seeded desi variety tolerant to
drought and heat; Dheera released during 2015 is also a desi
variety and the first of its kind in India, suitable for mechanical
harvesting. Nandyal Gram 49 released during 2016 is a highyielding
desi variety with attractive seeds; whereas Nandyal
Gram 119 is early bold-seeded kabuli variety released during
2015. These varieties have clearly demonstrated their advantage
(10%-15 % increase over popular varieties of the tract)
in farmers’ holdings in large-scale demonstrations and are being
preferred by farmers of not only Andhra Pradesh, but also
Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Odisha and Maharastra. Efforts are underway
to promote large-scale adoption of these varieties to
maximize long term productivity of chickpeas in rainfed vertisols
Study of Genetic Diversity in Indian Barnyard Millet Genetic Resources [Echinochloa frumentacea (L.)]
Sixtyfour Indian barnyard millet genetic resources were studied to assess the extent of genetic divergence for 18 quantitative traits using Mahalanobis D2 Statistic. Sixtyfour genetic resources of Indian barnyard millet were evaluated during kharif, 2020 in a lattice square design, replicated twice at Regional Agricultural Research. Based on Tocher’s method, the entire genetic materials were separated into eight distinct and non-overlapping clusters suggesting availability of genetic diversity. Cluster I has highest number of accessions (57) and the remaining were mono genotypic clusters II, III, IV, V, VI, VII and VIII containing only one accession each indicating high degree of heterogeneity among the genotypes. The widest inter-cluster distance was recorded between clusters IV and VII. Therefore, it is concluded that the genotypes to these clusters has to be intercrossed in order to create more diversity and improving grain yield in barnyard millet. The traits, grain yield per plant and panicle weight contributed maximum towards total divergence has scope of crop improvement through those traits. Diversity of parent paly main role for the successful of any breeding programme. So the crosses can be made among the parents having widest divergence would more likely to yield desirable recombination in segregating generations