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Pak. J. Bot., 47(6): 2283-2288, 2015.

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TAXONOMIC STUDY OF TEA CULTIVARS, CALTIVATED IN PAKISTAN BY USING MORPHOGENETIC APPROACH

MUHAMMAD SAJID^{1, 3}, MUHAMMAD ISHTIAQ^2*, SHER ASLAM KHAN¹, HABIB AHAMD¹, MEHWISH MAQBOOL², SHEZAD AZAM² AND TANVEER HUSSAIN²

¹Department of Botany, Hazara University, Mansehra KPK, Pakistan

²Department of Botany, Mirpur University of Science and Technology, Pakistan

(MUST), Bhimber Campus, Bhimber Azad Kashmir, Pakistan

³Department of Botany, Government Post Graduate College Abbottabad, Pakistan

^*Corresponding author e-mail: drishtiaqajk@gmail.com

Abstract: Tea (Camellia sinensis (L.) O. Kuntze is the most consumed beverage in the world. Six genotypic cultivars of tea, namely Indonesian, Sri Lankan, Ruopi, Qi men, Chuye and Japanese were taxonomically characterized by using morphogenetic approach. Randomized Completely Block Design (RCBD) technique was applied in the analysis and results were presented in form of phenogram. Taxonomically genotypes were divided into two clusters with genetic distance (GD) 4.5. The cluster-I contained four cultivars bifurcating into two sub-linages with difference of GD 3. Intra-cluster GD of between genotypes Japanese and Sir Lankan was 2.0 GD and Chuye and Ruopi genotypes were closely associated with 1.8 GD. The cluster-II indicated the trait homology between Indonesian and Qi Men populations was 1.4 GD. This demonstrates that Qi men and Indonesian genotype are genetically more closely related than other genotypes, may be originated from one ancestor. The qualitative character evaluation was conducted to explore adaptability of these genotypes to the environment. The vein pairs per leaf was highest in Indonesian (13.60), followed by Qi men (12.08). The internode distance was highest in Qi men (3.7 cm) succeeded by Ruopi (3.6 cm). The branch angle to stem value was 35° in Qimen followed by Japanese with 38°. This morphogenetic analysis shows that Qimen and Sri Lankan genotypes are congruently adapted to the environment which depicts that area is appropriate for the tea plant growth and cultivation. This analysis also reflects that although these tea cultivars are phenetically similar to each other but can be differentiated by use of numerical analysis.

Key words: Tea cultivars; Taxonomy; Morphometrics; Shankiari; Plant growth.