El-Sarag, E.I. (2013) Cowpea-sorghum mixtures as affected by water stress levels and forage mixing ratio in semi-arid regions. World Journal of Agricultural Sciences, 9 (4). pp. 325-334.
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Abstract
Mixing forage crops is the simultaneous cultivation of more than one crop species on the same land and time as a practical application of basic ecological principles; diversity, competition and facilitation, to encourage sustainability in agriculture and livestock production. Two field experiments were carried out in North Sinai Governorate, Egypt (31°08'04.3" N, 33°49'37.2"E) to investigate the effect of different water stress levels (normal irrigation, 100 % field capacity; FC and water stress conditions; 75 and 50 % FC) combined with four forage mixing ratio (pure stand and mixing ratio of 1:1; 1:2; 1:3 of cowpea/sorghum (C/S) mixtures) during 2011 and 2012 summer seasons. Results indicated that irrigated cowpea with 100% FC gave superiority of some growth characters but gave slight decrease with 75 % FC for fresh forage yields, while, the best sorghum growth characters and fresh forage yield was recorded from 75% FC treatment. Plants could accumulate more carbohydrates in their roots with mixing ratio of 1:3 C/S at the 2 & 3 nd rdcuts for sorghum and with 1:2 C/S ratio for cowpea at the 3rd cut. Also, the highest means of cowpea fresh forage yield were obtained when plants irrigated with 75% from field capacity and 1:2 mixing ratio at the 3rd cut. However, the maximum fresh forage yields of sorghum plants were achieved with 75% FC and pure stand treatment at the first and second cuts, which gave 30.95 and 15.33 t/ha, respectively. It could be concluded that cowpea-sorghum mixtures have alternative enhancement for both crops under semi-arid regions and gave economic fresh forage yield. For achieving this goal, mixtures should be irrigated when field capacity reached 75% (5833 m3/ha) and mixed with 1:2 mixing ratio
| Item Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Uncontrolled Keywords: | Cowpea-Sorghum, Forage mixing ratio, Fresh forage yield, Leaves/Shoot ratio, Relative growth rate, Root length, Water stress |
| Author Affiliation: | Department of Agronomy, Faculty of Environmental and Agricultural Sciences, Suez Canal University, El-Arish, Egypt |
| Subjects: | Plant Protection |
| Divisions: | Sorghum |
| Depositing User: | Ms Ishrath Durafsha |
| Date Deposited: | 21 Jan 2014 04:48 |
| Last Modified: | 21 Jan 2014 09:29 |
| Official URL: | http://www.idosi.org/wjas/wjas9(4)13/4.pdf |
| URI: | http://eprints.icrisat.ac.in/id/eprint/12403 |
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