Affiliation:
1. University of Belgrade, Faculty of Agriculture, Belgrade-Zemun, Serbia
2. Institute of Field and Vegetable Crops, National Institute of the Republic of Serbia, Novi Sad, Serbia
Abstract
Red clover is an important perennial fodrage legume and a rich source of
highly nutritional voluminous forage for livestock feed, which is
continuously improved by plant breeding efforts that rely significantly on
trait correlation studies. A two-year field trial was conducted at Rimski
Sancevi, Novi Sad, Serbia. The aim of this research was to assess
correlations of important morpho-agronomic traits and forage quality
properties of 46 red clover accessions of diverse origins. The highest
Spearman?s correlation coefficient (0.97, p<0.01) was found between the
branch number and internode number per stem in the first experimental year.
The green mass yield and the dry matter yield in both years had very high
(0.95, p<0.01) and high (0.86, p<0.01) correlations, respectively. The stem
height and internode number per stem had intermediate correlations in both
years (0.68, p<0.01, and 0.50, p<0.01, respectively), and stem height
exhibited an intermediate correlation with green mass yield (0.57, p<0.01,
and 0.62, p<0.01, respectively) and dry matter yield (0.60, p<0.01, and
0.56, p <0.01, respectively) in both years. Thus, the indirect selection for
higher plants with higher numbers of internodes per stem may contribute to
accomplishing higher yield performance per plant. Although the branch number
showed the highest positive correlation (p<0.01) with internode number per
stem and an intermediate positive correlation (p<0.01) with stem height,
this trait had a low correlation with green mass yield and dry matter yield
and cannot be used as a criterion for indirect selection.
Funder
Ministry of Education, Science and Technological Development of the Republic of Serbia
Publisher
National Library of Serbia
Subject
Plant Science,Soil Science,Agronomy and Crop Science,Animal Science and Zoology
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