Abstract:
Five Kuru Wee rice accessions collected from plant genetic resources
center, Gannoruwa, Peradeniya were characterized on the basis of 12
agronomic traits in a field experiment in Maha season 2013/2014. The aim
of the study was to understand whether the selected Kuru Wee traditional
rice accessions are significantly differed in their morphological traits from
each other or not since they were distinguished with different accession
numbers in PGRC catalogue. Ten days old seedlings of all the accessions
were transplanted in rows with 15 x 20 cm gaps, according to a randomized
complete block design, in triplicates, having 3 rows per replicate and 20
plants per each row. Plant height, days to flowering, number of tillers/plant,
number of fertile tillers/plant, panicle length, panicle weight, filled
grains/panicle, total grains/panicle, filled grain percentage, 100 grain
weight, total grain weight/plant and biomass/plant were recorded according
to the Standard Evaluation System for Rice. Harvest index was also
calculated considering the biomass and grain yield. The data were analysed
by principle component analysis followed by factor analysis using SPSS.
Three principal components exhibited more than one Eigen value showed
about 95 % of the cumulative variance. The PC 1, 2 and 3 showed 40 %,
29.1 % and 25.8 % variance for the traits respectively. Five Kuru Wee
accessions were grouped into 4 clusters at 18 minimum distances. Kuru Wee
accessions 3465 and 3982 were morphologically similar while three other
accessions were significantly differed from each other. Existence of four
rice accessions in Kuru Wee group is confirmed in the present study while
accession numbers would be duplicated in 3465 and 3982. This must be
confirmed by SSR markers.
