Abstract

MARTINEZ-YANEZ, Beatriz et al. PRODUCTIVITY OF NON-CONVENTIONAL MAIZE HYBRIDS WITH YELLOW ENDOSPERM FOR THE HIGH VALLEYS OF MÉXICO. Agrociencia [online]. 2017, vol.51, n.6, pp.635-647. ISSN 2521-9766.

Every year Mexico imports 10 million Mg of yellow maize grain therefore production must be increased, which requires improved varieties. The objective of the present study was to determine the productive capacity, heterosis and precocity of 12 non-conventional hybrids of yellow maize with improved varieties, lines and simple crosses as parents. The non-conventional hybrids, as well as their parents, were evaluated in four uniform experiments during the spring-summer cycles of 2013 and 2014 in the experimental fields of the Faculty of Graduate Studies Cuautitlán, of the National Autonomous University of Mexico and of the Valley of Mexico Experimental Field of the National Institute of Agricultural Forestry and Livestock Research. The combined analysis of variance of the four experiments for yield detected highly significant differences for environments and genotypes and the interaction was significant. The variety ‘324 #’ with subtropical germplasm source was the parent with highest yield (9.1 Mg ha-1), but statistically similar to the non-conventional hybrids ‘V-53A’ x ‘324 #’ (8.2 Mg ha-1), although these two hybrids had significantly fewer days to male flowering with respect to the parent variety ‘324 #’. Within environments, the best hybrids were the non-conventional ones and principally those that had the parent variety ‘324 #’. The best hybrids ‘V-53A x 324 #’, ‘V55A x 324 #’ and ‘V-54A x 324 #’ presented heterosis with respect to the best parent (-9.9, -14.9 and -11.1 %, respectively), which is explained by the excellent productivity of the variety ‘324 #’. These three non-conventional hybrids are outstanding and can be used for commercial production in the High Valleys of Mexico because their yield and precocity significantly surpass the varieties in commercial use ‘V-54A’ and ‘V-55A’.

Keywords : yellow grain; non-conventional hybrids; improved varieties.

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