STABILITY ANALYSIS IN MUSKMELON (CUCUMIS MELO L.)

Abstract

Stability anaysis in muskmelon for 11 quantitative traits using Eberhart and Russell (1966) and Perkins and Jinks (1968) models showed significant genotypic mean square for all the characters indicating enough variability among the 24 muskmelon genotypes. The G x E interaction was highly significant for 6 characters i.e. days to first male flower, day to first female flower, main shoot length, fruit equatorial diameter, TSS and fruit weight in both the models. Fourteen genotypes for days to first male flower, 14 for days to first female flower, 7 for main shoot length, 16 for fruit equatorial diameter, 15 for TSS and 13 for fruit weight were found stable across the environments. Three genotypes namely PMM-97-19, PMM-251 and PMM-191 were found stable across the five environments for all the six characters. On over all basis, the desirable stable genotypes for fruit yield having superior fruit quality traits were Pusa Madhuras, PMM-249, PMM-97-19 and PMM-208.