Phenotypic characterization of faba bean (Vicia faba L.) landraces grown in Palestine

This study was conducted to investigate the morphological and agronomical variations and the level of resistance to leaf rust Uromyces visiae - faba among nineteen Palestinian faba bean (Vicia faba L.) landraces. And analyze their traits including: days to flowering, days to fruit setting, plant height, number of branches on main stem, lowest pod height, pod length, pod width, number of pods per plant, number of seeds per pod, 100-seed weight and total pod weight per plant were studied. Leaf rust severity calculated as the percentage of leaves covered by the pathogens was estimated three times during the growing season. Significant differences were observed among genotypes for all characters. The nineteen faba bean lines were clustered into four groups based on six morphological and agronomic traits (pod length, pod width, number of pods per plant, number of seeds per pod, 100-seed weight and total pod weight per plant). Several genotypes could be considered as promising material for pod production. A significant variation of leaf rust disease severity was observed. Accession VF-13 showed the lowest disease severity (18%), but VF-6 showed the highest disease severity (69%) while the control (susceptible genotype) showed 59.7%. These accessions could be used as a valuable source for leaf rust resistance. Further studies are needed to compare the productivity of these genotypes with international varieties and identify QTL controlling the productivity of these genotypes and to study the variation between and within these genotypes at the molecular level.