Genetic diversity in open pollinated spinach (Spinacia oleracea) germplasm

Analysing the genetic worth of germplasm in a varietal improvement programme is foremost. Information regarding genetic diversity of the base population from which potential parents are to be selected is important as it measures variance in terms of total divergence. Keeping this in mind, the present investigation was conducted in a CRBD with three replications in Rabi 2019 at Jalandhar, Punjab. The D2 analysis was conducted on 20 genotypes (Green star, Palak Harit Shobha, Super All Green, Evergreen, Supriya, All Green, Palak Harita, Komal Spinach, Palak All Green, Spinach Solan and Harit) of open pollinated spinach grouped them into seven clusters. Cluster VI was the largest cluster having seven genotypes. Cluster I, V and VII had high cluster mean for first cutting yield. Cluster VII was superior to other clusters for maximum number of traits and had highest inter cluster distance indicating the presence of highly diverse genotypes in it. Therefore it was concluded that one of the parents in a hybridization programme can be selected from cluster VII (namely, Supriya, Evergreen, Palak Harita and Green Flavour) and other parent can be selected from cluster IV (Green Star) which had highest inter cluster distance from cluster VII. Cluster VII and cluster IV together covered most of the traits with respect to high cluster mean therefore, superior hybrid or transgressive progenies can be obtained from such a combination of parents