Advantages and Disadvantages of Bulk Method

Advantages of Bulk Method
  • Simple and inexpensive
  • Little record keeping.
  • Easy to handle populations as bulk harvest is done.
  • Natural selection is effective, possible to carry out artificial selection if required.
  • Selection for some environment dependent characteristics like disease resistance, cold and high temperature tolerance can be carried out when environment is favorable for disease epidemic or not conducive for normal growth and fruit set due to very high and very low temperatures. Till that year, the bulk can be maintained easily.

Disadvantages of Bulk Method

  1. Requires more time duration to develop a new variety
  2. Pedigree record is not maintained, so we cannot trace back progeny to the parent plant.
  3. Not a suitable method for greenhouses
  4. Large number of progenies has to be selected at the end of bulking period.
  5. Natural selection may also work against desirable traits.
  6. Not much scope for skills
  7. Maximum productivity is established in F2 generation of method
  8. No recombination occurrence among superior lines

Last modified: Monday, 2 April 2012, 6:16 PM