Assessment of genetic diversity among veldt grape (Cissus quadrangularis) ecotypes

Investigation on assessment of genetic diversity of fifty veldt grape ecotypes collected from different geographical locations of Tamil Nadu was conducted at TNAU, Coimbatore during 2019 -2020. The experiment was laid out in a RBD with three replications. Among the fifty ecotypes evaluated, majority of ecotypes (64%) exhibited moderate green coloured petiole, 23 ecotypes (46%) produced kidney shaped leaves, 16 ecotypes (32%) with cordate leaves, 7 ecotypes (14%) with circular shaped leaves and 4 ecotypes (8%) with pentagonal shaped leaves. Flowering was observed only in 5 ecotypes (TNCq7, TNCq8, TNCq28, TNCq32, TNCq34) with greenish pink - coloured flowers and the rest remained in vegetative stage only. Variations were observed for seventeen morphological traits of Cissus ecotypes. The ecotype TNCq32 recorded increased values for plant height (216.4cm), internodal length (10.82cm), stem yield (275.6g), root weight (8.03g), root length (16.70 cm) and number of lateral roots per plant (8.66). Likewise the ecotype TNCq23 registered increased petiole length (2 cm), leaf width (5.76 cm) and ecotype TNCq31 with enhanced number of twiners per plant (18.30) and number of main roots per plant (2.66). Among the morphological traits, highest GCV and PCV were observed for number of matured leaves, number of twiners per plant, number of primary roots per plant, plant height and petiole length. The genetic divergence analysis done by using Mahaloanobis D² statistics indicated that the cluster IX with one ecotype (TNCq32) was found to be superior among rest of the collection with highest values for root weight (8.03), root length (16.70), root girth (3.52), number of secondary roots per plant (8.66), internode length (10.82), plant height (216.4), stem yield (275.60) and minimum value for days taken for rooting (4.66). The maximum inter-cluster distance of 207.55 was observed between cluster1and cluster 9, followed by cluster 2 and cluster 9 (178.87).