COMPARISON AMONG POPULATIONS, THEIR CROSSES AND COMMERCIAL HYBRIDS OF MAIZE

Abstract

Exploitation of heterosis has been the main point to increase maize productivity in this century. However, the varieties use this phenomenon in a different way. This work was designed to compare the performance of open pollinated populations, their crossings and commercial hybrids in two different locations. The results demonstrated that the environment is important for the expression of the genetic potential of the plants. In the favorable environment the crossings performed better than the populations and the commercial hybrids outperformed both. In the unfavorable environment ali genotypes presented low grain yield. This fact demonstrated that superior genotypes could not express their genetic potential in environments with limitations for plant development. As a consequence, the choice of the commercial variety to be acquired by the farmers should take into account the environment and the management level that will be adopted in the crop.