Abstract:
Lack ofhigh yielding and early maturing varities are the bottlenecks for Kale production.
Moreover, there has been little information regarding the level and magnitude of genetic
variation present in the collected Ethiopian Kale accessions for green vegetable yield and yield
related traits. Therefore,theobjective of this study was to estimate the genetic variability and
charcterassociationfor vegetable yield and yield related traits among Ethiopian kale
accessions.The experiment was carried out using 7x7 simple lattice design at DZARC during the
2017 main cropping season.Theanalysis of variance revealed highly significant differences
(p<0.01) among accessionsforall traits except days to second leaf picking. High genotypic
coefficient of variation (GCV) and phenotypic coefficient of variation (PCV) were estimated for
number of leaves per plant, leaf fresh weight, leaf dry matter content,fresh biomass and leaf
yield.High broad sense heritability (h
2b) estimate were obtained for number of leaves per plant
(97.36%), fresh biomass (96.56%), leaf fresh weight (95.51%),leaf dry mattercontent (95.17),
leaf yield (93.66%), leaf width (78.92%), leaf petiole thickness (78.26%),leaf petiole length
(64.51), days to first leaf picking (61.16%), and leaf length (28.16%). Higher genetic advance as
percent of mean values were recorded for number of leaves per plant(131.41),fresh biomass
(79.41), leaf dry matter content (73.72), leaf yield (66.52), leaf petiole thickness (40.37), leaf
width (36.08), leaf fresh weight (34.02), leaf area (29.83) and leaf petiole length (23.65). High
h
2
b coupled with high GAM were obtained for number of leaves per plant, leaf fresh weight, leaf
dry matter content, leaf width, leaf petiole length, leaf petiole thickness, fresh biomass and leaf
yield. Leaf yield showed positive and significant genotypic correlation with number of leaves per
plant, leaf fresh weight, leaf dry matter content, days to first leaf picking and days to second leaf
picking. Path coefficient analysis at genotypic level revealed positive and direct effect of days to
first leaf picking (0.58), leaf dry matter content (0.35),leaf fresh weight (0.15) and number of
leaves per plant (0.04) on yield. Cluster and distance analysis of quantitative characters based
on multivariate analysis pointed out the existence of three divergent groups.The inter cluster
distance was maximum between cluster one and three(D2 = 147.84), while the minimum distance
was between two and one(D2 = 40.56).It can be concluded that variation generated for these
traits is manily due to genetic and moderate role of environmental factors and these were the
most important for selection criteria in developing high yielding Ethiopian kale accession. In
general, the present study revealed the presence of variability among accession for most studied
traits. This recalls further confirmation at multi-location and over years to develop high yielder
varieties.
