MSc.

The study entitled “Characterization of okra [Abelmoschus
esculentus L. Moench] genotypes in North Kerala” was carried out in the
Department of Plant Breeding and Genetics, College of Agriculture, Padannakkad
during 2015-2017. The main objective of the study was exploration and collection
of okra genotypes in North Kerala and evaluation of collected accessions for
morphological characterization, genetic variability and diversity in qualitative and
quantitative traits. On the basis of eco-geographic survey conducted in North
Kerala, 44 accessions of Abelmoschus esculentus were collected from Kannur,
Malappuram and Kasaragod district and the passport data of these accessions
were prepared. During the exploration in areas of okra collection, a wide
variability was noticed with respect to its morphological traits.
Thirty eight accessions out of fourty five were evaluated for various
qualitative and quantitative traits in augmented design using two checks viz
Salkeerthi a variety released from Kerala Agricultural University and Arka
Anamika from Indian Institute of Horticultural Research (ICAR-IIHR),
Bangalore. They were subjected to morphological characterization for fourteen
qualitative traits based on IPGRI descriptors and genetic variability analysis for
nineteen quantitative traits.
The morphological characterization showed distinct morphotypes in the
okra accessions as depicted by variation in branching habit, stem colour, leaf
shape, leaf colour, flower colour, fruit shape, fruit pubescence and fruit position.
The analysis of variance indicated significant differences among the accessions
for all the quantitative characters except number of locules per fruit and fruit
length.
However among the checks there was no significant difference for
characters such as days to 50 per cent flowering, internode length, number of units
in epicalyx, size of sepal, size of petal and fruit diameter. When checks were
compared with accessions, characters like number of fruiting nodes, size of sepals

and size of petals did not show any significant difference. Two accessions viz,
AE-16 followed by AE-20 recorded higher green fruit yield than two checks with
AE-16 recording maximum. The accession AE-20 was also superior for characters
such as number of marketable fruits per plant, primary branches per plant and
required lesser number of days to attain marketable maturity. The accession AE-5
had shown superiority for important fruit characters such as fruit weight and fruit
diameter. All these accessions showed no incidence of fruit and shoot borer
except AE-5.
Among the components of variability, high heritability coupled with high
genetic advance as per cent of mean was observed for
plant height, primary
branches per plant, internode length, fruit weight, fruit diameter, days to
marketable maturity and green fruit yield indicating effectiveness of selection
based on phenotypic performance of these traits. Yield being a complex character,
the association analysis of component characters of yield revealed high positive
genotypic correlation for characters such as primary branches, fruit weight and
number of marketable fruits. Significant negative genotypic correlation was
exhibited by first flowering node with green fruit yield. Path coefficient analysis
revealed that internode length, number of fruiting nodes, fruit diameter and
number of marketable fruits per plant are the main determinants of green fruit
yield in okra as indicated by their high positive direct effects and the characters
first flowering node and days to 50 per cent flowering are major determinants of
earliness as indicated by their high negative direct effect on green fruit yield. So
improvement in yield will be efficient if selection is done based on all these
characters.
Genetic diversity analysis based on Standardized Euclidean Square
Distance for nineteen quantitative characters grouped thirty eight accessions into
seven clusters. The clustering showed that there is no parallelism between the
geographical distribution and clustering pattern. On the basis of qualitative
characters cluster analysis with UPGMA (Unweighted Pair Group Method with

Arithmetic mean) method grouped the 38 okra accessions into three main clusters
as distinguished by branching pattern, leaf and stem colour.
There was a total of twenty cross combinations of genotypes belonging to
clusters with high inter cluster distance and superior mean performance based on
the overall ranking in the clusters for the four attributes viz. fruit weight,
marketable fruits per plant, days to marketable maturity and green fruit yield. AE-
5, AE-10, AE-16, AE-18, AE-20 and AE-30 were identified as promising. The
present investigation projected the importance of AE-16 and AE-20 as one of the
parents for higher heterosis in F1 and potential transgrents in the subsequent
generation. Both these accessions have considerably high green fruit yield per
plant greater than the checks Salkeerthi and Arka Anamika. Similarly the
accessions like AE-10, AE-18, AE-30 belonging to cluster I, V and IV were
identified as superior in yield and AE-5 belonging to cluster VI as promising with
highest fruit weight. If these genotypes are involved in crosses with Salkeerthi, the
popular variety of KAU with excellent fruit characters will give potentially high
yielding segregates with good market value.