evaluation of phenologic, morphologic and yield characteristics of chickpea germplasms in ferdowsi university of mashhad seed banki. deci type chickpeas

in order to study the morphological, phenological and yield characteristics of 70 desi chickpea genotypes, a trial was conducted on 2007 in research farm of agriculture faculty of ferdowsi university of mashhad. in this study, 70 desi chickpea genotypes from ferdowsi university of mashhad seed bank, were planted in plots without replication including one to four planting rows at maximum length of 2.5 m and row space of 50 cm. some characteristics were measured for each accession based on chickpea descriptors, including the days from emerging to flowering, flowering to pod setting, flowering to maturity, plant height, leaflet length and width, number of leaflet per leaf, leaf length, leaf area, number of node per main stem, number of primary, secondary and tertiary branches, flower length, pod length, number of pod per plant, number of seeds per pod, seed color and shape, 1000 seed weight, and seed yield. the results showed that rang of days from flowering to maturity were 32 to 44 days. highest (47%) and lowest (20%) number of genotypes for days from flowering to maturity had ranges from 37 till 39 days and less than 37 days, respectively. the range of plant height among genotypes was 53 cm and mcc708 with 63 cm had the highest plant height. the height of the first pod from soil surface of 13% of genotypes was more than 15 cm. seed yield in 64% of genotypes, those had the highest seed yield, was more than 400 gm-2 and mcc608 with 745 gm-2 had the most seed yield. in general, there was considerable diversity among chickpea genotypes for assessed characteristics. so it is possible to exploit this variation in breeding programs for improving yield of chickpea.