Five banana cultivars resistant to the Black Sigatoka Disease were grown at the experimental field of the Universidade Federal de Goiás (UFG), located in the Southwest region of the State of Goiás (Brazil). This work aimed the introduction of Black Sigatoka resistant cultivars as well as the characterization of the morphological aspects of such cultivars at that climatic region. The following characteristics were evaluated, in the first three cycles: days between planting and flowering, leaf number at flowering and at harvesting, fruit and hand number per bunch and fruit number per hand. A canonical variable analysis was also done, by the Tocher method. The evaluated characteristics were similar during the three growing seasons, insuring the morphological characterization of such genotypes in this climatic region. The cultivars false FHIA 18 and Caipira were harvested 393 days after planting data, showing highest precocity among the other cultivars. As expected, FHIA 21, a plantain type cultivar, showed the highest growing cycle (488 days after planting data). The climatic condition and the elevation of that experimental area may have helped to increase the growing cycle of those cultivars when in comparison to other climatic regions. For the harvesting characteristics, the cultivars FHIA-01 and false FHIA-18 promoted the best results compared to the other ones. For hand number, the cultivar Thap Maeo had the best results during the three growing seasons, establishing that morphological characteristic for that genotype. Plant height at flowering was highest for FHIA-21 and Thap Maeo and both cultivars were mostly damaged by hard winds.
Musa spp; cultivars resistance; crop components
