STUDIES ON SOYBEAN BREEDING

Abstract

The present investigation was carried out at Sak.ha Agricultural

Research Station, during the three growing seasons 200 I, 2002 and

2003 to study the inheritance of earliness such as (flowering and maturity dates, filling period), and some growth attributes such as (plant height, first pod height) and yield and yield components such as (number of pods, number of seeds, number of branches per plant, seed yield weight/plant, number of seeds per pod and 100-seed weight). Six varieties and one line of soybean (Glycine max) were used in this study namely; Crawford (1), L86-K096 (2), Quinitz (3), Egyptian (4), Giza22 (5), Toano (6) and Ware (7). Crossing among the parental material by means of a half diallel system was initiated in 2001 growing season. In 2002 season, the obtained hybrid seed form each of 21 crosses were sown to obtain F2 seeds. Meantime, the same work of the previous season was reported for obtaining more FI seeds. In the third season 2003 season, all the diallel mating progenies (seven parental varieties, FI hybrid and their F2 crosses) were evaluated in a Randomized Complete Block Design (RCBD) with three replications. Data were recorded on 10,10 and 40 individual guarded plants chosen at random for parents, F1 and F2, respectively. The data obtained for each traits were analysed on individual plant mean basis. An ordinary analysis of variance was first performed. Heterosis was computed as mean squares and as the percentage of F1 and F2 means performance from mid and better parent values for individual crosses. The data were genetically analysed by the procedures developed by (Grifing, 1956 and Hayman, 1954).