Correlation between morphological characters and the sex phenotypes of Myristica fragrans Houtt Trees

Abstract

Nutmeg is a dioecious plant where male and female flowers are generally located on different trees. Identification of early tree sex phenotypes in the vegetative phase will help grower optimize land productivity. This aim of this study was to identify morphological characters that are associated with sex expression. In this research 188 accessions numbers of nutmeg were used as genetic material consisting of 104 female and 84 of male trees. The morphological characters observed were habitus, leaves, flowers, fruit, seeds, and mace. The relationship between sex expression and morphological characters was tested by the individual proportion on each character and Pearson correlation. The results showed that morphological characters could not predict sex expressions. Male tree habitus and corolla size were generally bigger than female but female pedicellus size was bigger than male ones. There were no growth and yield component characters correlated to their yield.