QUANTITATIVE INTERRELATIONS AT THE FODDER PEA
Luminiţa COJOCARIU
Banat’s University of Agricultural Sciences and Veterinary Medicine, Timisoara,
Faculty of Agriculture, Calea Aradului nr.119, 1900 Timisoara, Romania,
Phone +40-256-277023, E-mail: [email protected].
Abstract:
In the new Romanian agriculture situation, there is a large offer of grains and fodder pea varieties.
Romanian continental climate, assure better conditions for pure and mixture pea than soy bean, thank to different
vegetation periods and different plants needs.
In our country conditions, foreign varieties shows in different ways their production capacity elements (green mass and
beans) which where emphasize through correlation coefficients.
In this paper we try to establish some interrelations between the main production features, to show the each meaning
and the connection with others to assure the production and stability.
The results are based on the behaviour of those five varieties of different origin studied during the three years interval
in the Banat`s Plain, part of the Panonic Plain.
Introduction
The fodder pea belongs to the vegetal plant category with high protein content and essential amino acids.
For example it’s lisine content is higher than in soy bean (1).
This plant can be used as feed for animal, special for the milk cows. Also fodder pea can be administrated as
green mass, and its fruits can be used as excellent concentrate forage. On the other hand, fodder pea can be mixed with
other forage plants to improve the protein content of the animal feedstuff (1, 2).
Key words: fodder pea, quantitative interrelations
Material and Method
Research was carried out between 2003 and 2005, and experiments were set at the Didactic Station of the
Agricultural and Veterinary University of the Banat in Timişoara. The soil on which were carried out the experiments is
a weakly gleyied cambic chernozem.
As biological material, we used five spring pea cultivars, of which: three cultivars of fodder pea (Magistra,
Austin C2, and NS-Junior), and two cultivars of green pea (Eiffel and Athos) of different origins.
Results and discussion
The study of the correlation is a procedure indispensable in improvement works in fodder pea, providing the
opportunity of combining in a mathematical methodology, biological and size aspects in plants.
In order to make an overall characterization related to the nature of link between the different features in forage
fodder pea, we measured the phenotypic correlation coefficients between the different features (table 1).
Table 1
Correlation between the main production features in the studied fodder pea cultivars
Feature
Plant
Dry
Protein
Weight plant
height
matter (%) content
(g)
(cm)
(%)
The number
0,123
0,701
0,189
0,127
of fodder
pea beans
Plant height
0,568
0,991xxx
0,857xx
(cm)
Dry matter
0,585
0,232
(%)
Protein
0,867xx
content (%)
Weight plant
(g)
Data presented in table 1, show that between the fodder pea cultivars exist some important positive
correlations. For example, the correlation coefficient between the height plant and protein content is extremely positive.
If the height plant increase, the protein content increase proportionally. The correlation coefficient is only significant,
regarding the relation between the height fodder pea plant and it weight. These data are in accordance with other results
obtained by other national and international researchers. Also there is a higher positive correlation between the protein
content and weight plant.
The statistic model used in assessing the different cultivars from the point of view of several production
features expressed on the ground of PC1 and PC2 (the main component 1;2) 92,11% of the total variability, enough to
allow the identification of genotypes (cultivars) valuable for one or more features.
Figure 1 shows that the most value cultivars regarding the protein content, height and weight are Magistra and
NS-Junior. The Eiffel is the most value regarding the dry mater and the number of pea beans.
Analyzing the vectors for the studied features (fig.2) allow the assessment of the correlation between them,
depending on the cosines of the angle between the vectors and the variability within each feature depending on the
vector length.
From the graph presented in figure 2, it can be seen that there is a positive and significant correlation between
protein percent and plant height; height and weight plant and between dry mater and the number of pea beans.
The variability of the fodder pea cultivars, appreciated through the length vector of each studied
characteristics, indicates the existence of a reduce variability for the protein content, height and weight plant. The
largest variability is obtained by the dry mater percent and the weight of the fodder pea plant.
Conclusions
The conclusions we could reach vary not only in the material but also in the real conditions in which the
correlation were obtained.
Fodder pea cultivars we studied represent a valuable material and in the same time a very diversified one from
an ecological point of view, offering the opportunity of choosing some useful genitors for the improvement of the
different features.
The most valuable cultivars from the point of most studied features are the: NS-Junior, Magistra, Austin.
References
1. Beresiu Ileana, 1976 – Cultura mazării şi producerea conservelor de mazăre. Editura Ceres, Bucureşti.
2. Čupic T., 2005 – Interakcija prinosa i komponenti prinosa graška (Pisum sativum L.), Croatian Symposium on
Agriculture.
3. Yan W., et al., - 2000 – Cultivar evaluation and mega-environmen investigation based on the GGE biplot.
Crop. Sci., 40, p. 597-605;