Inheritance of Resistance to the First and Second Broods of the European Corn Borer in Corn

The European corn borer is one of the most destructive insect pests of corn. Our objective was to determine the inheritance of host resistance in corn to the first and second broods of the European corn borer with Design III and S1 progeny analyses. All estimates of additive and dominance genetic variances were significantly different from zero except for the dominance variance for second-brood cavity counts. Additive genetic variance, however, was the major component of the total genotypic variance in the F2 population for all traits. Average level of dominance was in the partial range for the date of anthesis (0.74), first-brood leaf feeding (0.81), and second-brood cavity counts (0.53), but in the range for complete dominance (1.09) for the second-brood visual rating. Some genes have dominance action in conditioning resistance to first and second broods of the European corn borer. Selection procedures that emphasize selection for additive genetic variance in the population for first- and second-brood larval feeding resistance would be effective for improving host resistance