Genetic diversity in in situ and ex situ collections of sorghum [Sorghum bicolor (L.) Moench] landraces

Farmers cultivate and maintain sorghum landraces for the various food purposes. With the development of high yielding cultivars and hybrids during the present day, the extent of cultivation of landraces has been reduced. In order to compare the genetic diversity that existed earlier and in the present-day cultivation of sorghum landraces by the farmers, an experiment was conducted at the College of Agriculture, Raichur, Karnataka, India. Comparison has been made between gene bank accessions (ex situ collections) and corresponding cultivated landraces collected from norther Karnataka districts (in situ collections) during Rabi seasons of 2016–2017 and 2017–2018. A total of 152 gene bank accessions from ICRISAT, Patancheru with 140 farmers variety accessions as ex situ collections along with seven check cultivars were laid out in an augmented design. The landraces were compared for nine qualitative characters and 14 quantitative characters including morphological, yield, yield attributing and physiological characters. Descriptive statistics, principal component analysis and cluster analysis were carried out for both the collections separately and the results were compared. This research revealed that despite the availability of high yielding cultivars and hybrids, some farmers still maintain the landraces and hence genetic diversity is kept even today.