Gene action of yield and yield contributing characters in chilli (Capsicum annum L.)

Gene action of yield and yield contributing traits in Chilli (Capsicum annuum L.) was studied in three selected crosses, involving four parents, including their F1's, F2's and first back crosses generations. The six generations of these crosses were evaluated during summer, Rabi 2012 for days to first flowering, days to first picking, plant height (cm), number of branches per plant, fruit length (cm), fruit diameter (mm), number of seed per fruit, number of fruits per plant (green), green fruit yield per plant (g), number of fruits per plant (dry), dry fruit yield per plant (g), days to last picking and capsaicin content (%). The data generated was subjected to test epistasis and six generation mean analysis. It was found that, all the types of gene action i.e. additive, dominance and interaction components were found to be play a major role in their inheritance. The importance of additive, dominant and epistatic interactions suggested the use of recurrent selection, reciprocal recurrent selection, diallel selective mating scheme or bi-parental mating system for improvement of these traits, while the heterosis breeding is recommended for the crosses where complimentary epistasis was observed. Taking in to account the complex behavior of genes in these traits, modified bulk selection is recommended for varietal improvement of chilli in these crosses, in which the selection is performed after attaining the homozygosity