| Popis: |
As part of efforts to expand and document the horticultural germplasm repository at the National Horticultural Research Institute (NIHORT), Ibadan, eleven okra genotypes collected from farmers’ fields in south-west Nigeria were characterized alongside one improved variety in an open field experiment for eight important agro-morphological characters: plant height, number of days to flowering, pod length, pod width, fruit pedicel length, number of pods per plant, number of seeds per pod, and 1000-seed weight. Significant variations were observed among cultivars for most of the traits except days to flowering and number of seeds per pod. Moderate to high heritability estimates in the broad sense recorded for seven of the eight traits; suggest that environmental influence on the traits were minimal. Number of pods per plant had moderate to high positive genotypic and phenotypic correlations with plant height, pod length and pedicel length. Principal component analysis (PCA) revealed that the first three principal components accounted for 87.45% of the total variation based on the eight characters observed. The PCA suggested that pod width, number of seeds per pod, plant height, fruit pedicel length, number of pods per plant, pod length, 1000-seed weight and days to flowering contributed significantly to the total variation observed. This study reveals the potential of the genotypes to enhance NIHORT’s okra improvement and genetic conservation research.Keywords: Okra, genotypic correlation, phenotypic correlation, principal component analysis, genetic conservation |
