Combining ability studies for earliness and yield in bottle gourd (LAGENARARIA SICERARIA MOL. STANDL.) in kharif season

Gene action, Combining ability varience derived by crossing ten diverse bottle gourd parents were studied through half diallel analysis including 45 F1 hybrids for earliness and yield components. Data was recorded for nine quantitative characters.. The mean squares due to GCA were significant for all the nine characters. The ratio of σ²gca/ σ²sca suggested that non additive gene action had greater role with inheritance of characters. Out of ten parents Bhagirathi was the best general combiner as it showed high gca effect in desirable direction for most of the traits. the best promising hybrids regarding sca effects for yield and majority of yield traits were Pusa Summer Prolific Long X Pusa Naveen, Samrat X NDBG 619, Samrat X Bhagirathi , Pusa Summer Prolific Long X Bhagirathi, NDBG 5006X NDBG 129, and NDBG 129 X PBOG-89 Hence these crosses can be utilized in further heterosis breeding for improvement in bottle gourd