Breeding of Vegetable, Spice and Tuber crops (2+1)

Mass selection

• Mass selection in cross-pollinated species takes the same form as in self-pollinated species; i.e., a large number of superior appearing plants are selected and harvested in bulk and the seed used to produce the next generation.

• Mass selection has proved to be very effective in improving qualitative characters, and, applied over many generations, it is also capable of improving quantitative characters, including yield, despite the low heritability of such characters.

• Mass selection has long been a major method of breeding cross-pollinated species, especially in the economically less important species.