Selection Procedures for Improving Some Economic Characters and Correlated Responses in Cotton (Gossypium barbadense L.) Cross

A study was done at Sakha Agricultural Research Station Farm, Kafr El-Sheikh, Egypt during 2019-2021 growing seasons. The study aimed at assessing the efficacy and usability of various selection procedures, determining the effectiveness of selection for superior families and estimating the response to selection. The materials utilized for selection of promising families in early segregating generations included F2, F3 and F4 generations of Giza 94 × S106 cotton cross.. Findings revealed better F4 means than the F3 and F2 means for all studied characters due to the selection procedures used. High heritability values were recorded for most studied characters. Significant desirable correlations were noticed between seed cotton yield with lint yield, bolls/plant, lint/seed, seeds/boll and boll weight. Canonical discriminant analysis among F3 families showed that the first five canonical functions accounted for 100% of total variances. While first canonical discriminant function represented 46% of the total variance among genotypes with the greatest Eigen value and prevailed by great loading from most yield characters and micronaire reading. Ten of the selection indices surpassed direct selection in improving lint yield. The highest actual advance in lint yield for F3 obtained from selection index comprising lint yield/plant in addition to bolls/plant, seeds per boll and lint per seed. In F4 generation, the maximum actual gains were obtained for most yield traits with indices involved lint yield/plant and seeds/boll with lint/seed. Most of the selected families in F4 scored high values for almost all the studied characters and surpassed the corresponding means of selected families in F3 and F2 generations; these selected families might be used to improve cotton yield and fiber quality in breeding programs.