Evaluation of new maize single and three way crosses for earliness and grain yield over three locations

Abstract EN

New 17 yellow inbred lines of maize were mated to the two early testers; inbred line SK11 and SC173 at Sakha Agricultural Research Station in 2012 growing season.

The resulting 17 single crosses, 17 three way crosses and two commercial hybrids SC162 and TWC352 were evaluated at three locations i.e.

Sakha, Nubaria and Sids stations in 2013 growing season.

Data were collected for days to 50% silking, plant height and grain yield.

Analysis of variance revealed the mean squares due to locations (Loc.), crosses (Cr.) and Cr x Loc.

interaction were highly significant for all of studied traits.

Mean square due to lines (L) , tester (T), L x T and their interaction with locations were significant or highly significant for all traits.

The additive gene effects were most responsible for controlling the inheritance of all traits except for grain yield.

The best parental inbred lines which showed desirable GCA effects were SK5056/52 for earliness, SK5062/55 for plant height and SK5038/41 for grain yield.

Tester SC173 was the best combiner for all traits except grain yield, SCSK5038/41 x SK11, TWCSK5066/58 x SC173 which were stable for grain yield, outyield and earliness than checks.

These two crosses were selected for advanced testing in maize breeding program as early maturing crosses and of high yielding ability.