Breeding Studied On Drought Tolerance In Maize

The objectives of this investigation were to test the genotypic differences in drought tolerance, estimate the heritability, and to evaluate the role of gca and sca of inbreds in hybrid under water stress. The main results were:1-Hybrids G507AxG278, L81BxG278 and G507AxL 81B were high tolerance to drought.2-Correlation between grain yield and yield components were higher under stress than non-drought in most cases. 3-All studied yield and yield components showed high broad- sense heritability estimates under stress and non-stress treatments in both seasons.4- The expected gain from direct selection for grain yield under stressed or non-stressed environments would improve the trait under consideration in a way better than the indirect selection for any other traits. 5-Inbreds L 81B, G 278 and G 507A showed positive and significant GCA effects for grain and ear yield and most of yield components traits under stress or non-stress treatments