Genetic Variability in Yield and its Components in Upland Rice Grown in Acid Soils of North East India

Upland rice grown in hills suffers serious yield loss due to soil acidity. A core set of germplasm was used for genetic analysis of yield and nineteen other component traits. Analysis of variance revealed presence of high variability among the genotypes for all the traits. Heritability (h2) estimates were generally high except for flag leaf angle. GCV was high for flag leaf area, plant height, no. of tillers per plant, no. of ear bearing tillers, no. of filled grains/panicle, panicle weight, root length and area, straw weight and grain yield. The results indicted the core set of germplasm contained high genetic variability. The broad sense heritability and genetic advance as percentage of mean indicated that panicle weight and grain yield/plant are the two most important yield components and selection based on these traits would be very effective in upland rice grown under acid soil conditions.