This research was carried out in three environments of Vera Cruz State, Mexico, during Spring-Summer 1997. The objectives of the work were to evaluate the response of S1 families at environments with and without soil acidity, to estimate genetic parameters in these families, and to make a selection of S1 families based on their performance. A total of 129 S1 families or lines were evaluated in two replications for each environment. The S1 families came from the maize SA-6 population of the Centro Internacional de Mejoramiento de Maíz y Trigo (CIMMYT). The traits measured were: days to pollen shed (DPS), days to silking extrusion (DSE), plant height (PH), ear height (EH), anthesis-silking interval (ASI), prolificity (PRO), rotten ears (RE) and grain yield (GY). The results showed differences among environments (E), families (F), and environment x families (E x F) for all traits. The traits were severely affected in the acid soil (Campo Experimental Papaloapan), moderately affected in a less acid soil environment (Centro de Bachillerato Tecnológico Agropecuario # 36) and showed normal performance in non-acid soil (Campo Experimental Cotaxtla). The values of heritability were high: 0,65 for PH, 0,65 for EH, 0,58 for GY and 0,52 for DPS. The estimates of low and high limit of the confidence intervals for the heritability of each one of the studied variables were different from zero. The highest genetic coefficients of variation (CV) were for GY (18,29%) and ER (20,95%). The selected families were superior than the population mean for six variables, which means that the selected lines can be recombined in order to improve the population for tolerance to soil acidity.
grain yield; breeding; acid soils; tropical maize; genetic gains
