Sorghum Landraces Phenotypic Diversity in Kenya

Understanding the dynamics of genetic resources and improving and maintaining sorghum productivity require characterising the available Kenyan sorghum genetic diversity. The aim of this study was to determine the extent and structure of diversity in Kenyan sorghum landraces. The diversity of 148 sorghum accessions collected from Kenya's Western, Turkana, Coast, and Eastern regions was assessed using phenotypic data. The accessions were phenotyped using qualitative and quantitative morphological characters. The majority of the accessions were high yielding, as evidenced by the number of panicle branches (43), the length of the panicle (21 cm), and the grain weight (1.5 g).

The majority of the sorghums were late maturing and tall, as evidenced by the number of leaves and nodes, as well as the average number of days to 50% blooming (88 days). The maturity, height, and panicle length of Turkana and coast sorghums were identical. The number of panicle branches had the highest Broad-sense heritability (0.957). Majority of the sorghums had dull green midrib (49.55%), no basal tillers (83%), had waxy bloom (39.64%) and produced prop roots (87%). Erect panicles that were loose or semi-loose predominated (69%) and peduncles that were slightly exerted predominated (83%) in the accessions. PCA demonstrated 67 percent of the total variance with only two Eigen values. The findings of phenotypic cluster analysis revealed two major groups, each of which was subdivided into four sub clusters.