Preliminary Investigation on Some Agronomic and Morphological Variations of Within and Between Bambara Groundnut Landraces

Abstract

Bambara groundnut [ Vigna subterranea (L.) Verdc.] is an indigenous legume crop in Africa. It has comparable value to other legumes fo r food and nutritional security in the continent. However, small-scale farmers continue cu ltivating unimproved landrace varieties over the production areas in sub-Saharan Africa. Bambara groundnut landraces exist as heterogeneous mixtures of seeds, which typ ically contain a few to several seed morpho-types that may embrace wide genetic diversit y. In this study, the agro- morphological variations of 213 Bambara groundnut l andraces were evaluated to determine the presence of within- and between-landr aces of pod and seed morphology, out of which only 49 were used to access their gene tic variability using 9 agronomic traits while 158 landraces were used to determine leaf mor phology. Most of the landraces displayed pointed, round and yellowish pod colour, with grooved and oval seed shapes. For leaf morphology, 49.4% had round leaves, while 21.5% had elliptical leaves, with 55.7% landraces being heterogeneous possessing more than one leaf shape. Significant differences (P< 0.05) were detected for seed traits and leaf morphology including seed height, canopy spread and terminal width. Leaf morp hology could be a useful marker for strategic breeding and genetic conservation of Bamb ara groundnut. Keywords: Bambara groundnut, Genetic diversity, Landraces, L eaf morphology, Partially balanced design.