Early-maturing dual-purpose sorghums: Agronomic trait variation and covariation among landraces

Landrace cultivars represent potentially valuable source material for breeding dual-purpose (grain and stover) sorghums. To characterize the genetic variation and interrelationships for major agronomic traits among potential dual-purpose sorghum landraces, 74 accessions, primarily from Southern Africa, the Sudan, and India, were evaluated in five environments at Patancheru, India. These environments, at 17°N with 520-540 mm rainfall during the growing season, are representative of the major sorghum-growing areas in India and the Sudanian Zone of Western and Central Africa. Significant genetic variation and high heritabilities (P = 0.01, h2= 0.63-0.92) were observed for seedling vigour, grain and stover yields, growth rate and harvest index. Time to flower was correlated with stover yield (r = 0.48, P = 0.01) and an index (Iev) of total economic value (r = 0.44, P = 0.01) but not with grain yield (r = 0.22, P = 0.05). Grain and stover yields varied independently (r = 0.22, P = 0.05) and were similarly related to Iev, values (r = 0.79 and r = 0.77 (P = 0.01), respectively). The 13 landraces with the highest Iev values (adjusted for maturity) had above-average growth rates and harvest indices that ranged from 20 to 38%. Landraces from Botswana and India were more highly represented in the high Iev set than in the full set of accessions.