Genetic Diversity, Variability, and Correlation Studies in South Indian Culinary Melon (Cucumis melo ssp. agrestis var. acidulus) Accessions

Abstract

Genetic diversity, parameters and correlation among 15 quantitative traits were studied in 80 diverse culinary melon accessions from South India during the summer 2019 and 2020 at the College of Horticulture, Sirsi. The ward’s clustering revealed the presence of five clusters, which are differentiated based on geographical regions. The phenotypic coefficient of variance (PCV) estimate is higher than the genotypic coefficient of variance (GCV) in all the characters studied, indicating the influence of the environment on the expression of characters. Among the traits, except for vine length, seed cavity width, seed length and seed diameter, all other quantitative traits exhibited the highest estimate of PCV and GCV. High heritability and high genetic advance as percent mean were recorded for all the characters except vine length and seed cavity width. The correlation study revealed that peduncle length (0.524), average fruit weight (0.588), fruit length (0.551), seed cavity length (0.496), flesh thickness (0.415), and fruit number per vine (0.386) had a highly significant correlation with fruit yield per vine. The high genetic variability and nature of correlations among the fifteen traits in the collected accessions would serve as a basis for deploying specific accessions and formulating strategies for further improvement of culinary melon.