Variation analysis and fine family selection on half-sib progenies from clonal seed orchard of Pinus massoniana

Abstract

Variation of traits that include height, diameter at breast height (DBH), stem volume, crown width, straightness, wood basic density, tracheid length and width of open-pollinated progenies from clonal seed orchard of Pinus massoniana was analyzed. Differences in traits such as growth, tree form and wood quality among families was significant, which indicated that the improvement potential was notable. Heritability of height and wood basic density reached 0.691 and 0.640, respectively. According to a correlation analysis between traits, stem straightness could be improved indirectly when growth traits are improved; growth traits were significantly correlated with wood basic density; and wood basic density was not significantly correlated with length and width of the tracheid. Under the selection ratio of 10%, genetic gains were 19.74% and 19.32% respectively, and selected families from the progeny test stands at the age of five years and eight years were the same. Genetic correlation of height, DBH and stem volume was also significant at the level of 0.01. These show that selection of the short rotation of P. massoniana for pulp and paper use would be efficient for five-year-old trees. According to the comparison of the heritability of all the traits and taking into account the result of canonical correlation analysis, height could be considered as the most important index for selection. Given wood quality of all the families, and flowering and fruit settings of the clones in a seed orchard, twelve fine families were selected at 10% selection ratio of height growth and stem volume.