Agro-botanical Response of Forage Sorghum-soybean Intercropping Systems under Atypical Spatio-temporal Pattern. | [Pakistan Journal of Botany • 2017]

Author(s):

1. MUHAMMAD AAMIR IQBAL: Department of Agronomy, The University of Poonch Rawalakot (AJK),Pakistan

2. BRANDON J. BETHUNE: Department of Plant Sciences, University of California Davis-95616,USA

3. ASIF IQBAL: Department of Agronomy, Faculty of Agriculture, University of Agriculture Faisalabad-38040,Pakistan

4. RANA NADEEM ABBAS: Department of Agronomy, Faculty of Agriculture, University of Agriculture Faisalabad-38040,Pakistan

5. ZUBAIR ASLAM: Department of Agronomy, Faculty of Agriculture, University of Agriculture Faisalabad-38040,Pakistan

6. HAROON ZAMAN KHAN: Department of Agronomy, Faculty of Agriculture, University of Agriculture Faisalabad-38040,Pakistan

7. BILAL AHMAD: State key Lab of Crop stress Biology in Arid Areas, Northwest A & F University,P.R. China

Abstract:

Forage sorghum is a climate smart crop having drought, heat and salinity tolerance but its forage yield is not sufficient to meet forage requirement during summer months. Sorghum-soybean intercropping is a way to increase productivity but reduction in the yield of component crops owing to severe competition continues to remains a biggest challenge. A multiyear field trial was executed to assess the productivity of sorghum-soybean intercropping systems sown at varied times (sorghum and soybean sown simultaneously, sorghum sown 18 days prior to soybean and vice versa) and spatial arrangements (sorghum-soybean sown in 4:1, 4:4, 2:1 and 2:2 row proportions). Factorial arrangement of randomized complete block design was used to conduct the field trials with four replicates. Agronomic variables of forage sorghum (plant height, stem diameter, number of leaves, plant leaf area, fresh and dry weights per plant) were positively affected when it was sown 18 days earlier to soybean in 2:1 row proportion. The same intercropping system gave significantly (p<0.01) higher green forage yield, dry biomass of sorghum along with mixed (sorghum+ soybean) green forage yield and dry biomass yield. However, soybean green and dry biomass yields remained unmatched when it was sown 18 days earlier to sorghum in 2:1 row proportion. Thus, delayed sowing of one of the intercrops for 18 days has the potential to yield higher forage of component crops and this type of intercropping might be suggested depending upon the availability of irrigation water and its fitness into the prevailing cropping system.

Page(s): 987-994

DOI: DOI not available

Published: Journal: Pakistan Journal of Botany, Volume: 49, Issue: 3, Year: 2017

Keywords:

Component crops , Forage productivity , Row intercropping , Deferred sowing , Planting geometries

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