Abstract
This study was undertaken to evaluate the extent and pattern of genetic diversity for immature pod traits in Ethiopia cowpea landrace collections. Eighty one landraces and improved cultivars were tested in a 9 x 9 simple lattice design. Analysis of variance revealed highly significant (P<0.01) or significant (p<0.05) differences among the genotypes for all traits. The first four principal components were able to explain 81% of variation for quantitative traits and 76% for qualitative traits. The genotypes were grouped into three distinct clusters, the first, second and third clusters with 60, 15 and 25% of the genotypes in that order. The landraces were distributed all over the clusters while the improved cultivars were absent in the second cluster. Shannon-Weaver diversity indices also showed existence of adequate genetic variability among the genotypes for qualitative traits. Shannon-Weaver diversity indices ranged from the lowest of 0.50 for pod curvature to the highest of 0.99 for pod shape. The study clearly showed that, even if the genotypes were classified into a few cluster, there was adequate divergence among the clusters showing existence of considerable genetic variability for immature pod traits for exploitation in future breeding for better green pod yield and quality in cowpea. Key words: Cowpea, diversity, genotypes, immature pod, qualitative traits, quantitative trait.
Highlights
Cowpea (Vigna unguiculata (L.) Walp) is one of the most important grain legumes native to Africa (Timko and Singh, 2008)
Eighty one cowpea genotypes including 77 Ethiopian landraces collections kindly provided by the Ethiopian Institute of Biodiversity and Melkassa Agricultural Research Center and four improved varieties were selected for the study (Table 1)
A wide range of variation in immature pod yield was recorded, which ranged from 30 g per plant for genotype NLLPCPC-07-24 to 747 g per plant for genotype NLLP-CPC07-54
Summary
Cowpea (Vigna unguiculata (L.) Walp) is one of the most important grain legumes native to Africa (Timko and Singh, 2008). Information on the cowpea production and productivity is scantly but a few sources show that the average national yield of cowpea in Ethiopia is estimated to be 400 kg ha-1 (Bedru et al, 2019), while yields of 2200 to 3200 kg ha-1 have been commonly recorded from improved varieties with proper crop management and protection practices (MoA, 2012). It showed the comparative advantages of genetic and agronomic interventions. This study was proposed to determine the extent and pattern of genetic diversity among cowpea collections using immature pod related phenotypic traits
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