Interrelationships between Seed Yield and 16 Related Traits of 81 Garden Cress Landraces

Abstract

This research uses path analysis to determine the interrelationships among seed yield and 16 related Morphological traits. Eighty-one garden cress accessions from IPK (Department of Leibniz Institute of Plant Genetics and Crop Plant Research) were grown in two growing seasons (2012–13) to determine the important components of seed yield. Observations were recorded on 20 other canola traits. Correlation coefficient analysis revealed that seed yield was positively correlated with all traits except plant height (PH) in the first year and except main axis length (MAL) and PH in the second year. Sequential path analysis (SPA) identified the thousand-seed weight (TSW), number of siliques per plant (NSP) and height of first silique (HFS) as important first order traits influenced seed yield in first year. Plant height, NSP, and the TSW were important first-order traits that influenced seed yield in the second year. This indicates that breeding programs should be based on these traits for further improvement of the garden cress. All direct effects were significant, as indicated by bootstrap analysis. The results suggest that TSW and NSP could be used as a selection criterion in selecting for increased seed yield in garden cress.