Improvement of pigeonpea for drought, disease and insect tolerance/resistance through induced mutations

Pigeonpea (Cajanus cajan L. Millsp) is the second most important grain legume after cowpea (Vigna unguiculata L. Walp) in the semi-arid areas of Kenya. At the farm level, the grain yield of pigeonpea is lower than that of other grain legumes and cereals. The low grain yields are mainly attributed to the late-maturity of the local land-races which are prone to drought, insect attack and disease damage. Recently, a mutation breeding program was initiated to augment the conventional breeding approaches to alleviate some of these constraints. Three varieties, namely, Kat 60/8, Kat E31/4 and Kat 777, representing early, medium and late maturing groups were irradiated with three doses of gamma rays, namely 80-100 Gy, 110-125 Gy, and 140-150 Gy. Single plant progenies from the M2 and M3 generations of were screened and selected for tolerance to drought, tolerance/resistance to Fusarium wilt and insect tolerance in the field. Selections were advanced to M4 generation. In this paper, preliminary results of these studies reported. (author). 5 refs, 7 tabs