About the heritability influence to the growth performance in Scots pine (Pinus sylvestris L.) progeny trials

The progeny trials of the Scots pine founded in Järvselja Training and Experimental Forest District in 1966 and 1967 by E. Pihelgas were analysed to estimate the heritability of height and diameter characteristics, and also the dependence of progeny properties on the plus tree and single tree phenotype. The data set consists of 513 height and 3707 breast height diameter measurements of 39-and 40-years-old progenies of 40 mother trees. The analysis was carried out with the SAS package, Release 9.1, mainly with ANOVA tools implemented SAS/MIXED procedure. Heritability h² was calculated from the mother tree and residual variance components assuming a limited number of father trees for each progeny. Using the REML estimation procedures, the heritability of the stem height was found approximately equal to 1 and it was 0.19 for the DBH. Considering the mother tree characteristics, the age was significantly correlated with the progeny height.