Combining Ability Analysis in Long-Fruited Bottle Gourd

Combining ability for yield and its components in long-fruited bottle gourd was studied in a set of 10 × 10 diallel cross excluding reciprocals. The mean squares of general combining ability as well as specific combining ability were highly significant for all the nine characters, namely, vine length, days to open first male flower, days to open first female flower, days to first harvest, fruit length, fruit girth, number of fruits/plant, fruit weight and total yield/plant. This indicated the importance of both additive and non-additive variances for the expression of these traits. There is, therefore, scope for improvement both by selection and hybridization in this crop. The ratio of components of genetic variance indicated preponderance of additive gene action over non-additiveness for these traits. Thus recurrent selection appears to be effective for the improvement of these characters. Combining ability and mean performance of parents and hybrids suggested that heterosis breeding can be commercially exploited in the present genetic material of bottle gourd.