Genetic divergence studies regarding different growth and foliage characters of walnut (Juglans regia L.) germplasm

Genetic divergence of 29 exotic walnut cultivars introduced from abroad and 25 local selections from seedlingpopulation was studied. The analysis of variance revealed significant differences among accessions for each character understudy. Based on Mahalanobis D2 values the accessions were grouped into eight clusters. Cluster I had a maximum of12 accessions followed by cluster II with 11 accessions. The mean intra and inter cluster distance (D) revealed that clusterVII had the highest intra cluster distance (2.171), while the inter cluster distance was the greatest between cluster II andIV (10.528). Characters like plant height, trunk girth, plant spread, plant volume, leaf length, leaf width and number ofleaflets contributed the most to total divergence.