Floral Position and Subtending Leaves Influence Crossing Success in Chickpea (Cicer arietinum L.)

The study aimed to investigate the influence of maturity scales of subtending leaves (STL) [i.e. fully-developed STL (FDSTL), fully-emerged but not fully-developed STL (FESTL), and immature STL that not even fully emerged (IMSTL)] and STL pruning [no pruning and half-pruning of STL] on hybrid pod setting in chickpea. A total of 12,266 flower buds were manually crossed to determine hybrid pod setting as influenced by STL maturity scale with or without source-limiting (half-pruning) conditions. The highest hybrid pod setting was recorded in FDSTL (31-34%) followed by 10-12% in FESTL and only 2-3% in IMSTL. The half-pruning of STL reduced hybrid pod setting in FDSTL and IMSTL (p < 0.05). Likewise, pruning of STL reduced self-pod setting except for FDSTL. STL maturity scales significantly influenced pod size and seeds pod(-1), which followed the order FDSTL > FESTL > IMSTL (p < 0.05). Thus, the results suggested that the selection of the early flower buds adjacent to FDSTL could improve crossing success in chickpea.