Genetics of Yield and its Component in Ash Gourd {Benincasa hispida (Thunb.) Cogn.}

An experiment was conducted to study the pattern of inheritance of vine length, fruits per plant, fruit weight and yield per plant from six generations (P1, P2 , F1, F2 , B1 and B2) means of ten crosses obtained by crossing nine inbred in ash gourd. Majority of the crosses indicated the contribution of dominance gene effects and duplicate epistasis. Among epistasis interactions, addictive x additive (i) played a significant role for vine length, fruits per plant and fruit weight, while additive ??additive (i) and dominance ??dominance (1) contributed towards fruit yield. These results suggest that heterosis breeding might be more effective for speedy improvement of this crop.