**3.3 Genetic correlation among selected traits**

Significant and positive correlations were also observed between aflatoxin accumulation and traits such as cob and plant aspects and insect damage while staygreen, open-tip and ears per plant were not significantly correlated (**Table 8**).


#### **Table 8.**

*Genetic correlation between aflatoxin accumulation and selected agronomic traits.*

#### **Figure 1.**

*Dendrogram based on agro-morphological traits showing relationships among 36 maize genotypes using the neighbor joining procedure.*

#### **3.4 Heterotic grouping based on multiple agro-morphological traits**

Significant agro-morphological traits assigned genotypes into respective heterotic groups. Three groups were observed at 40% co-efficient of determination but at 20%, two major clusters (Ga and Gb) were revealed. Group Ga was made up of 20 members which were mostly local genotypes except Ki3, CML108 and NC340. All the exotic lines (16) clustered in group Gb. (**Figure 1**).
