Performance of Broad Bean (Vicia faba L.) Genotypes for Pod Yield and Yield Contributing Morpho-physiological Components under Mid Hill Conditions of North Western Himalayas

Aims: The present investigation was planned to evaluate thirty five broad bean genotypes along with one check Vikrant-B for yield and some yield contributing morpho-physiological components.

Study Design: Randomized Block Design.

Place and Duration of Study: The experiment was undertaken at Experimental farm of the Department of Vegetable and Floriculture CSK HPKV, Palampur situated at 32° 6' N latitude and 76° 3' E longitude at an elevation of 1290.8 m amsl during 2015-16.

Methodology: The experimental material constituted thirty five genotypes along with one check collected from different parts of country. Observations were recorded on ten randomly selected plants in each replication on days to 50% flowering, node at which 1st flower appears , branches per plant, nodes per plant, plant height (cm), days to maturity, pod length (cm), pods per plant, pod yield per plant (g), pods per node, seeds per pod, seed yield per plant (g), seed size (cm), 100-seed weight, harvest index (%), total soluble solids (oBrix), dry matter (%), ascorbic acid (mg/100 g) and protein content (%). The analysis was carried out using OPSTAT Software following the method suggested by Singh and Chaudhary (1977).

Results: The analysis of variance revealed that mean squares due to genotypes were significant for all the traits. On the basis of mean performance, ‘Local-1-C’ was the top ranking genotype for pod yield per plant which significantly outperformed all the genotypes with an increase of 30.83 per cent over check ‘Vikrant-B’. Further, genotypes viz., HB-123-B and HB-123-C showed superiority for both pod yield and seed yield per plant over check and other genotypes.

Conclusion: The best performing genotypes could be used for further evaluation under different environments to be released as a variety (s) or under hybridization programmes for Broad bean improvement.