Morphometric characterization of maize hybrids and their parents using DUS guidelines

Maize is one of the economically important crop in the world. Protection of Plant varieties and Farmers Right Act (2001) insists on distinctness, uniformity and stability (DUS) characterization of extant, farmers and new varieties and recommends the registration of varieties for any one specific novel character. Studies initiated to verify morphological characters in two hybrids including GH-0727, Arjun and five parents CI-4, CI-5, KDMI-15, KDMI-16 and CI-4XCI-5 of UAS, Dharwad, Kranataka, India. The results revealed that the 7 genotypes have variation for different morphological characters like tassel attitude of lateral branches, tassel angle, ear shape, plant height, tassel density of spikelet's and thousand seed weight.