Accelerating silage maize breeding: forage yield and nutritive quality of doubled haploid-derived hybrids

Maize (Zea mays L.) is a widely cultivated cereal crop for silage production due to its high biomass yield and nutritional value. Developing high-yielding and nutritionally superior hybrids is increasingly vital in the face of climate change and rising global forage demand. Doubled haploid (DH) technology accelerates hybrid development by enabling the rapid production of fully homozygous pure lines. This study aimed to evaluate silage maize hybrids derived from DH inbred lines for the effects of yield and nutritional quality.

Eight recently developed hybrids (derived from doubled haploid inbred lines: S1, S2, S6, S9, and S11; derived from conventional inbred lines: S7, S8, and S10) and four commercial silage checks (S3, S4, S5, and S12) were used in this study. The experiments were arranged in a randomized complete block design with three replications. In this study, agronomic traits including plant height, ear ratio, stem ratio, and forage yield were evaluated, along with forage quality parameters such as dry matter, crude protein, neutral detergent fiber (NDF), acid detergent fiber (ADF), acid detergent lignin (ADL), and relative feed value.

Genotypes S6 and S9 provided higher forage yield, plant height, ear ratio, and a lower stem ratio. All genotypes of dry matter, crude protein, NDF, and ADF values were within the desired range. DH-derived hybrids outperformed checks and those derived from conventional inbred lines regarding forage yield and the investigated agronomic traits. The DH technology has great potential in developing high-yielding hybrids in a short time in silage maize breeding.