ABSTRACT

Twenty fluted pumpkin (Telfairia occidentalis) accessions were grown in two locations (Umudike and Obio Akpa) in randomized complete block design during the rainy season of 2017 to evaluate the variability in yield, yield components and nutrient content. The following data; number of leaves, number of branches, vine length, fresh leaf weight and marketable yield were collected at 8, 10, 12 and 14 WAP. Data obtained for each trait were averaged and mean values used for statistical analysis. The analysis of variance (ANOVA) showed significant variation (p<0.05) in number of branches/plant, number of leaves/plant, length of vine/plant (cm) in Umudike and no significant variation (p>0.05) in the same traits in Obio Akpa. Although not significant (p>0.05), genotype ACC6 produced the highest marketable yield (3047t/h) and the highest leaf yield (1215t/h) at Umudike while ACC11 produced the highest marketable (2368t/h) and the highest leaf yield (1781t/h) at Obio Akpa. The mean squares of analysis of variance for the two locations revealed a significant (p<0.001) genotype, error and variance ratios for the nutritional and anti – nutritional traits, which indicated the presence of wide genetic diversity among the genotypes and potentials for exploiting the observed diversity for the improvement of Telfairia occidentalis. The estimates genotypic variances were close to each other at both locations for all the traits. These lower error variances indicated that the genotypic component was the major contributor to the total variance for these characters in the two locations. In Obio Akpa, moderate broad sense heritability and genetic advance was observed, which indicated that the influence of environmental variance is more than genetic variance. Correlation analysis showed that number of branches/plant, number of leaves/plant, length of vine/plant (cm), marketable yield, and leaf yield were significantly and positively correlated with the total leafy yield per hectare (t/h). The highest positive correlation with total leaf yield per hectare (t/h) (r= 0.741**) was recorded in vine length/plant (cm) at 14 WAP. Path analysis indicated that number of leaves/plant at 14 WAP and number of branches/plant at 12 WAP imparted significant direct influence on total marketable yield and hence these traits could be used as selection criteria for improvement of marketable yield. Principal Component Analysis (PCA) was employed to evaluate the patterns of variation in these genotypes. The first two axes of the PCA captured 98.26% of the total variance. The dendrogram grouped the accessions into four clusters, suggesting that, nearly all the fluted pumpkins cultivated in Akwa Ibom State are mainly from four genotypes.