Author(s): K. K. MANDAL; S. SARKAR; D. MAJUMDER* AND M. A. HASAN

Abstract: Germplasm of cooking bananas (two cultivars and seven accession, namely Kanchkele 1,2,3,4,5 Behulla, Pantharaj, Kanchkele – 6, 7) were assessed at the Regional Research Sub-station, Sekhampur, Birbhum of Bidhan Chandra Krishi Viswavidyalaya during the years 2003-2005 by using twelve physical parameters with different multivariate techniques such as single linkage and average linkage within group hierarchical clustering of squared Euclidean distance matrix and principal component analysis (PCA). Cooking bananas under study formed five-(5) clusters group irrespective of the clustering techniques. Kanchkele – 7, Kanchkele – 5, Kanchkola –3 separated from the rest of the cooking bananas and formed single member cluster. Pantharaj, Kanchkele –6 & Kanchkele –2, formed the cluster –Kanchkele-1 Kanchkele, I – 4 & Behulla were grouped together to form cluster – 2. In principal component analysis (PCA) Kanchkele- 3 and Kanchkele – 7, was dominated by characters like fruit number and hand number contribuling 25.66% of total variation. Pantharaj & Kanchkele – 3 were dominated by hand number, bunch weight, fruit number and fruit diameter explaining 16.93% of total variance. It may be concluded that cooking bananas like Pantharaj and Kanchkela–3 may be suggested to grow for better yield in red and laterite region of West Bengal.

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