Heterosis studies for seed yield and it’s attributing traits in pearl millet (Pennisetum glaucum (L.) R. Br.)

The present heterosis study comprises of twelve parents which includes eight males, four females and thirty two crosses along with two checks of pearl millet. The genotypes were evaluated in Randomized Block Design with two replications during Kharif 2024-25, at experimental farm of National Agricultural Research Project, Chh. Sambhajinagar. Observations were recorded for 11 characters viz., days to 50% flowering, days to maturity, plant height, number tillers per plant, panicle length, panicle girth, test weight, grain yield per plant, fodder yield per plant, harvesting index and seed setting percentage. The mean sum of square for parents and crosses exhibited highly significant differences for all the characters. Parent vs crosses differed significantly for all the characters. The mean sum of squares for parents further partitioning of the variance due to various source of variation also showed the significant differences for all the characters under study. Among the parents, MS 98222A among lines and PS-4 and R 15241 among testers exhibited significant and desirable GCA effects for seed yield and for most of the traits. This parent can be utilized for future breeding programme to produce high yielding pearl millet crosses. The crosses like MS 98222A x R 15241, MS 00888A x PS-4, MS 97111A x R 15241, and MS98222A x R 16428 exhibited higher per se performance, heterobeltosis and standard heterosis. Such crosses can be used for their commercial exploitation in peal millet.