Effects of Crop–Hedgerow Intercropping on the Soil Physicochemical Properties and Crop Yield on Sloping Cultivated Lands in a Purple Soil of Southwestern China

Crop–hedgerow intercropping systems are important agroforestry systems for preventing soil degradation and soil nutrient losses on sloping cultivated land in the Three Gorges Reservoir (TGR) area of China. However, the mechanism by which hedgerow spatial layouts and the planting patterns affect soil nutrients and crop yields is still uncertain. A two-year field experiment was performed on a 10° slope to investigate the effects of slope position and different crop–hedgerow intercropping systems on soil physicochemical properties and crop yields. The treatments were a two-belt mulberry contour hedgerow (TM), a two-belt compound mulberry–vetiver hedgerow (TCMV), a two-belt compound mulberry–alfalfa hedgerow (TCMA), a seven-year-old two-belt mulberry contour hedgerow (7YTM), a seven-year-old mulberry border hedgerow (7YBM), a seven-year-old pure mulberry (7YPM), and a control treatment (CT, no hedgerows). In all treatments, except 7YPM, there was a significant (p < 0.05) increase in crop yield, clay content, soil total nitrogen (STN), acid-hydrolyzable nitrogen (AHN), and soil organic carbon (SOC) with declining slope position, whereas soil bulk density (BD), sand content, and soil pH showed the opposite trend. In TM, TCMV, TCMA, and 7YTM, the mustard yields and soil properties were better than those in CT, and there was no significant (p > 0.05) difference in mustard yield or soil properties between the upper-middle and lower-middle slope positions. Compared with CT, TCMV, and TCMA increased mustard yields by 8.28% and 9.86%, respectively, while 7YTM, 7YBM, and 7YPM reduced mustard yields by 7.69%, 17.69%, and 29.73%, respectively. TCMV and TCMA were confirmed to be viable intercropping systems for significantly reducing nutrient losses, improving soil quality, and changing soil nutrient distributions to maintain optimum crop yields on sloping lands.

Evaluation and demonstration of leguminous shrubs hedgerows intercropping with maize crop

Smallholder farmers influenced from the challenges of production constraints to afford farm family with surplus food. To improve this problem the present study was designed to evaluate legume shrubs hedgerow intercropping with maize. In the present study, the growth performance of Sesbania sesban and Cajanus cajan was evaluated to determine their potential in hedgerow intercropping. The result revealed that Sesbania sesban performs better than Cajanus cajan in terms of biomass provision in the successive pruning, mean height, branching, diameter at breast height and root collar diameter. Biomass produced from Sesbania sesban was significantly higher than Cajanus cajan, this plays great role in soil nutrient improvement and maize yield also increased. There was an increasing trend in soil properties in terms of organic C, total N, in legume treatments especially in Sesbania sesban hedgerow to the initial and control soils. Maize grain yield higher under Sesbania sesban hedgerow plot than Cajanus cajan, maize with fertilizer and control. This should be intensively demonstrated to sustain the agricultural production as an organic farming through integration of easily adapting, less competing with the companion crop, deep rooted and fast growing legume tree/shrub species. Further research is important in areas of determining decomposing rate of different parts, pruned biomass and potential species should be identified. Int. J. Agril. Res. Innov. Tech. 11(1): 60-68, June 2021

Effect of alley plants species and plantain cultivars on yield of 60-day cowpea grain in Umudike Southern Nigeria

Alley cropping or hedgerow intercropping is one of the many sub-systems of agroforestry technology. A 5 x 3 factorial experiment in a Randomized Complete Block Design (RCBD) with three replications was used to determine the effect of four alley woody species and three plantain cultivars on the yield of 60-day cowpea grain in the 2017 and 2018 farming seasons. The Alley species, plantain cultivars and Alley species x plantain cultivars treatment interactions showed no significant effects (p<0.05) on cowpea grain yield. Students t-test on the two farming seasons showed significant increase in yield of cowpea grain in 2018 than in 2017. Alley cropping technology could increase 60-day cowpea grain yield due to improved soil fertility in the system. Keywords: alley cropping, yield, 60-day cowpea, alley woody species, plantain cultivars