ESTIMATION OF HERITABILITY AND GENETIC ADVANCE FOR VARIOUS METRIC TRAITS IN SEVEN F2 POPULATIONS OF BREAD WHEAT (TRITICUM AESTIVUM L.)

Heritability estimates provide information about the traits that are transmitted from parents to their offsprings and it has a crucial role in selection criteria to improve grain yield. The purpose of the present study was to compute heritability and genetic advance of seven F2 populations derived through cross combinations of five parental varieties/lines of bread wheat Iqbal-2000, Lasani- 2008, 9444, 9432 and 9436. Data were recorded for seven metric traits: plant height, days to heading, flag leaf area, peduncle length, number of kernels per spike, kernel weight per spike and grain yield per plant. The estimates of heritability were low to high for all the traits studied except for kernel weight per spike which had a moderate to high value of heritability. Results depict that all the mentioned traits can be enhanced easily due to high values of heritability and phenotypic variations. The cross combinations 9436 × Iqbal-2000 and 9436 × Lasani-2008 had high heritability for most of the traits. Therefore, selection could be practiced among wheat crosses with special emphasis on crosses, namely 9436 × Iqbal-2000, to improve grain yield per plant.