Genetic Variability, Heritability and Expected Genetic Advance of Yield and Yield Related Traits in Desi Type Chickpea (Cicer Arietinum L.) at Bule Hora, Southern Ethiopia

Chickpea is one of most important pulse crops in Ethiopia. Despite its significance, the national average chickpea yield is low due to many constraints of which the unavailability of improved varieties for each growing and potential area. This research was conducted to evaluate genetic variability, heritability, and expected genetic advance of yield and yield related traits in chickpea genotypes. It was conducted at Bule Hora during 2022/23 cropping season that 36 Desi type of chickpea genotypes were evaluated using a 6 x 6 simple lattice design. The results of the analysis of variance showed the presence of significant variations among genotypes for nine characteristics. In this study, the phenotypic variance was higher than the genotypic variance for all the traits studied. However, the difference between phenotypic and genotypic variances was low, ranging from 0.05 to 5.46 for four traits, and the difference between phenotypic and genotypic coefficients of variation was <5% (1.89 to 4.32%) for six of nine traits. Furthermore, Phenotypic (PCV) and genotypic (GCV) coefficient of variations ranged from 5.32 to 41.77% and 3.43 to 37.45%, respectively. Heritability (H²) in broad sense and genetic advance as percent of mean (GAM) ranged from 23.91 to 80.40 and 5.89 to 69.18%, respectively. The estimates of GCV and PCV, H² and GAM were high for number of pods per plant, seeds per plant in gram, and grain yield.