The inheritance of bean size, pod size and number of beans per pod in cocoa (Theobroma cacao L.), with a note on bean shape

Abstract

Studies have been made on the F1 and F2 generations of crosses between the Amazon clones Nanay 32, Parinari 7, and Parinari 35. There is wide variation in size from pod to pod on a tree, and this is largely paralleled by variation in bean number, bean size remaining relatively constant. However in some trees bean size increases in the largest pods, bean number remaining constant. It appears that if a pod is too small for the inherent number of beans to be present at their inherent size, the number of beans which develop is reduced so that their inherent size is attained; if the pod is larger than is required for the full number of beans to attain their inherent size the beans may increase in size above the inherent value. Thus if the average bean size in a sample of pods taken from a tree indicates the inherent bean size reasonably accurately it is likely that the inherent bean number will be relatively underassessed, and conversely if the observed bean number indicates the inherent number relatively accurately it is likely that the observed bean size will overassess the inherent size. Scatter-diagrams may therefore be more informative than averages.