Pages: (1-11 )
Abstract
Lack of access to high quality seeds is a major factor contributing to the worsening of food security situation in Africa. High seed quality is essential for optimum stand establishment in maize; and it is therefore necessary to have seed vigour tests that permit rapid, objective and accurate evaluation of seed quality. This study was conducted to determine combining abilities of seed qualities in some Nigeria hybrid maize using Diallel procedure. Fifty-five different genotypes generated from half diallel crosses made among ten tropical inbred maize (Striga resistance and Early matured inbred germplasm) developed at International Institute for Tropical Agriculture (IITA) were evaluated for seed quality traits such as days to germination, percentage germination, seed dry weight, seedling length, initial seed quality and seed half-life, Results from diallel analysis indicated that the mean squares for GCA and SCA were highly significant for all seed quality attributes studied except days to germination. Estimate of GCA showed that parents 3(TZSTR 137), 5(TZEI 11), and 7(TZEI 15) recorded high values for nearly all the characters studied. Likewise, estimate of SCA identified Genotype 18 (2x9) as the best specific combiners for nearly all the characters studied. This study concluded that two best performing parents can combine and produce high quality hybrid maize.
Keywords: Specific combining ability, General combining ability, Seed Quality, Seed Vigour, Diallel Analysis.,