Vol. 5 (3) : 197 - 198 (2003)

SHORT COMMUNICATION

Association of Quality Character with Cane and Commercial Cane Sugar Yields in Sugarcane Anshuman Singh 1, P.K. Bhatnagar 2, A.Q. Khan 3 and P.K. Shrotria 4 1Research Scholar, 2Junior Research Officer, 3professor, Department of Genetics and Plant Breeding and 4Junior Research Officer, Sorghum Breeding Department of Genetics and Plant Breeding, G.B. Pant University of Agriculture and Technology, Pantnagar, U.S. Nagar , 263 145, Uttaranchal, India

The present investigation was carried out to study the associat ion of quality characters with cane and commercial cane sugar yields in sugarcane (Saccharum spp. complex) . It was found that cane yield had nonsignif icant negative correlations with juice brix juice sucrose juice purity and extract ion percents, w h e r e a s its associat ion with commercial cane sugar yield was highly significant posit ive. Commercial cane sugar yield had nonsignificant posit ive correlations with ju ice brix, juice sucrose, ju ice purity and commercia l cane sugar percents. Path coefficient analysis revealed maximum direct effects of commercial cane sugar per cent and juice sucrose per cent on cane and commercia l cane sugar yields. It is suggested that quality characters should also be taken into consideration in clonal selection programme for evolving improved sugarcane genotypes.

KEYWORDS : Correlation, Path coefficient, Sugarcane, Quality

Cane yie ld and sucrose content in ju ice , the characters sought for improvemen t in sugarcane, are negat ively associated with each other (Batcha and Sahi, 1972; Balasundaram and Bhagyalakshmi, 1978). To overcome this l imitation, commerc ia l cane sugar yield is estimated and emphasis is given to it in clonal selection. Cane and commerc ia l cane sugar yields are inf luenced by several quali ty characters. Hence it was c o n s i d e r e d d e s i r a b l e to workou t the r e l a t i o n s h i p of these c h a r a c t e r s with cane and commerc ia l cane sugar yields, so that an appropriate and eff icient selection strategy could be adopted for improvement .

The exper imenta l material consisted of 20 elite genotypes and 4 checks viz., Co 1148, CoS 767 (Mid- late), CoJ 64 and Co Pant 84211 (early) were planted in a randomized block design with 3 replications on 24 th Apr i l , 1996. The p lo t s ize for each ent ry represented 4 rows of 2.5 m length spaced 75 cm apart. Correlat ion coeff icients and path coefficients (d i rec t and ind i rec t e f fec t s ) o f charac te r s were worked out as suggested by Searle (1961) and Dewey and Lu (1959).

Author for Correspondence : Dr. A.Q. Khan e-mail : anshuman22923@yahoo.co.in

P h e n o t y p i c c o r r e l a t i o n c o e f f i c i e n t s o f the characters are presented in table 1. Juice brix, juice sucrose, juice puri ty and juice extract ion percentage showed negative and nonsignificant correlat ions with cane yield. Similar results were also reported by Pillai and Ethirajan (1993). Juice brix, ju ice sucrose, juice purity and commerc ia l cane sugar percentage (CCS%) showed a pos i t i ve but n o n s i g n i f i c a n t association with commerc ia l cane sugar yield. Cane yield showed a highly significant posit ive association with commercia l cane sugar yield. These results are in agreement to those of Reddy and Khan (1984).

Path analysis was based on phenotypic correlation coe f f i c i en t s and d i r ec t arid i nd i r ec t e f f ec t s of characters were determined for cane yield (table 2) and c o m m e r c i a l cane suga r y i e ld ( t ab le 3). Commercia l cane sugar per cent had highest direct effect on cane yield fol lowed by juice sucrose per cent. Other charac te r s cont r ibuted to cane yield indirectly via commerc ia l cane sugar per cent. The CCS% had h ighes t d i rec t e f f ec t on CCS yie ld followed by juice sucrose per cent. Other characters cont r ibuted to c o m m e r c i a l cane sugar yie ld via commercia l cane sugar per cent. Kang et al. (1983 and 1989) also gave higher emphasis on commerc ia l cane sugar per cent for improvement in commerc ia l

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Table - 1 : Phenotypic correlation coefficients cane quality characters with cane and CCS yie lds

Juice brix Juice sucrose Juice purity Juice extraction CCS Cane yield CCS yie ld % % % % % % %

Juice brix % 1.000 0.877** -0.070 0.263 0.762** -0.092 0.030

Juice sucrose % 1.000 0.399 0.382 0.973** -0.043 0.100

Juice purity % 1.000 0.264 0.554** -0.021 0.037

Juice extraction % 1.000 0.421" -0.127 -0.072

CCS % 1.000 0.000 0.413

Cane yield % 1.000 0.986**

CCS yield % 1.000

**Significant at 1% level; *Significant at 5% level

Table - 2 : Path coeff icient analysis for cane yield

In direct effect via

Juice brix % Juice sucrose % Juice purity % Juice extract ion % CCS %

Juice Brix % -2.252 1.032 0.097 -0.058 1.090

Juice sucrose % -1.975 1.176 -0.551 -0.084 1.391

Juice purity % 0.158 0.469 -1.382 -0.058 0.792

Juice extraction % -0.592 0.449 -0.365 -0.221 0.602

CCS % -1.716 1.144 -0.765 -0.093 1.430

Residual factor -0.7863

Table - 3 : Path coeff icient analysis for commercia l cane sugar yield

Ind i r ec t effect via

Juice br ix % Juice sucrose % Juice puri ty % Juice ex t rac t ion % CCS %

Juice Brix % -2.334 1.116 0.102 -0.060 1.206

Juice sucrose % -2.047 1.273 -0.579 -0.087 1.540

Juice purity % 0.163 0.507 -1.451 -0.060 0.877

Juice extraction % -0.614 0.486 -0.383 -0.228 0.666

CCS % -1.778 1.238 -0.803 -0.096 1.583

Residual factor 0.754

c a n e s u g a r y i e l d a s c o m p a r e d to o t h e r q u a l i t y

c h a r a c t e r s .

T h u s , o n t h e b a s i s o f p r e s e n t i n v e s t i g a t i o n , i t c a n

b e s u g g e s t e d t h a t t h e q u a l i t y c h a r a c t e r s s h o u l d a l s o

t a k e n i n t o c o n s i d e r a t i o n f o r s e l e c t i n g i m p r o v e d

s u g a r c a n e g e n o t y p e s w i t h h i g h c a n e a n d c o m m e r c i a l

c a n e s u g a r y i e l d s .

R E F E R E N C E S

Balasundaram, N. and Bhagyalakshmi , K.V. (1978). Variability heritability and association among yield and yield components in sugarcane. Indian J. Agric. Sci., 48 : 291-295.

Ba tcha , M.B.G.R. and Sahi , B.K. (1972). Studies on the associat ion of cer tain agronomic traits in sugarcane under subtropical cond i t i ons at Motihar i . In Diamond Jubi lee Symposium, Sugarcane Breeding Institute, Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu.

Dewey, D.R. and Lu, K.H. (1959). A correlation and path coefficient analysis of components of crested wheat grass seed production. Agron. J., 51 : 515-518.

Kang, M.S., Miller, J.D, and Tai, P.Y.P. (1983). Genetic and phenotypic path analysis and heritabili ty in sugarcane. Crop Sci., 23 : 643-647.

Kang, M.S. , Sosa, O. and Miller, J.D. (1989). Path analysis for per cent fibre, cane and sugar yield in sugarcane. Crop Sci., 29 : 1481-1483.

Pillai , S.V. and E tb i r a j an , A.S. (1993). Correlation between yield and components at three stages of selection in sugarcane. Sugarcane, 4 : 6-10.

Reddy, K.R. and Khan, A.Q. (1984). Association among yield and quality characters in sugarcane. Indian J. Agfic. Sci., 54 : 645-650.

Searle, S.R. (1961). Phenotypic, genotypic and environmental correlations. Biometris, 17 : 475-480.

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