GREEN SEED COAT COLOUR RETENTION IN LENTIL - University ...

mean days to maturity of all lines. After harvest the lines could be divided into
three maturity levels: early, medium, and late. Each maturity level could be
evaluated separately to maintain the same selection intensity for each level. Within
each maturity level a known genotype for example CDC Viceroy (early) and
1294M-23 (medium) should be included to use as a standard. Any genotype that
does not exhibit a more desirable phenotype would be discarded. This would allow
the same proportion of lines to be selected from each maturity range independent of
how the index scores for each level compare.
For final selections near the end of the breeding process, harvesting of
individual lines at the right stage may be required to decide upon the most desirable
green lentil lines. This should be successful as the preharvest treatment study found
that even when maturity was affecting the index score, there were still significant
differences in index scores for lines with similar maturities. Differing maturity
levels did not seem to affect index scores dramatically in the heritability study. The
tester set contained a wide range of maturities but still produced seed coat samples
that were in the least desirable green colour range of the index score. If maturity
ranges are not recognized there could be a shift towards longer maturing lentil lines
under the pretense that the lines are producing a more desirable green seed coat.
7.3 Recommendations for future research
This study has asked many questions that future research could answer. The
first could be to find quantitative trait loci (QTLs) that are associated with the
genetic variation for improved green seed coat colour in lentil. This would allow
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