Intercropping mixed cropping_principles_and_assessment_of_yield

Concepts and differentiation of inter and mixed cropping , Concepts and differentiation of inter and mixed cropping , Principles involved in inter cropping and mixed cropping Principles involved in inter cropping and mixed cropping

systems under rainfed and irrigated conditions and systems under rainfed and irrigated conditions and criteria in assessing yield advantages criteria in assessing yield advantages

Department of Agronomy, Forages and Grassland management, CSKHPKV, Palampur.

Presened by : Karan Verma :Cskhpkv Palampur

It represents cropping patterns used on a farm and their interactions with resources, other farm enterprises and available technology, which determined their makeup.

cropping system

Types of cropping systems

INTER CROPPINGIntercropping is growing two or more crops simultaneously on the same piece of land with a definite row pattern.

For example growing setaria +Redgram in 5:1 ratios i.e. after every row of setaria, one row of redgram is sown.

Thus, cropping intensity in space dimension is achieved. Based on the per cent of plant population used for each crop in intercropping system.

• The crops grown in association should have complementary effects rather competitive effects.

•The subsidiary crop should be of shorter duration and of faster growing habits to utilize the early slow growing period of main crop and they must be harvested when main crop starts growing. Faster sesamum, sawan or urd grown with red gram picks up branching and attains rapid growth.

Principles of intercropping

•Autumn planted sugarcane remains dormant after germination until February during which potato, berseem, lucerne, mustard could be taken successfully as companion intercrops. Cotton could be intercropped with onion, greengram or blackgram; and chillies and tomato could be intercropped with onion.

•Component crops should have similar agronomic practices.

• Erect growing crops should be intercropped with cover crops like pulses. These check the weeds and reduce soil erosion. The losses of water due to evaporation are also reduced.

•The component crops should have different root depths. This will minimize competition for nutrients, water and root respiration.

• A standard plant population of main crop should be maintained whereas that of subsidiary crops the plant population could increased or decreased as per demand of the situation.

•The planting method and management should be simple, less time consuming, economical and profitable so that it may have wider adoptability.

•Component crops of similar pests and disease pathogens and parasite infestations should not be chosen.

Types of intercropping

i) Parallel Cropping: Under this cropping two crops are selected which have different growth habits and have a zero competition between each other and both of them express their full yield potential. e.g. 1) Green gram or black gram with maize 2) Green gram or soybean with cotton.ii) Companion Cropping: In companion cropping the yield of one crop is not affected by other, In other words, the yield of both the crops is equal to their pure crops. That the standard plant population of both crops is maintained. e.g.1) Mustard, wheat, potato, etc. with sugarcane 2) Wheat, radish, cabbage, sugar beat etc., with potato.

iii) Strip Inter-cropping: Growing two or more crops simultaneously in different strips wide enough to permit independent cultivation but narrow enough for the crops to interact agronomical.

iv) Relay inter-cropping: Growing two or more crops simultaneously during part of the life cycle of each. A second crop is planted after the first crop has reached its reproductive stage but before it is ready for harvest.

v) Multistoried Cropping or Multi-tire cropping: Growing plants of different height in the same field at the same time is termed as multistoried cropping. It is mostly practiced in orchards and plantation crops for maximum use of solar energy even under high planting density. Examples,,,.. A)Eucalyptus + Papaya + Berseem, B) Sometimes it is practiced under field crops such as Sugarcane + Potato + Onion C) Sugarcane + Mustard + Potato D) Coconut + Pineapple + Turmeric/Ginger.

Advantage of intercropping

1. Intercropping gives higher income per unit area than sole cropping. 

2. It acts as an insurance against failure of crop in abnormal year. 

3. Intercrops maintain soil fertility as the nutrient uptake is made from both layers. 

4. Reduce soil runoff.

5. Total biomass production/unit area/time is increased because of fullest use of land as the inter-row space will be utilized which otherwise would have been used for weed growth. The farmer gets all his required agriculture commodities from a limited space. Thus the profit/unit area becomes higher. The fodder value becomes higher when a legume is intercropped with a non-legume e.i. Napier + cowpea – Napier + beerseem. It offers best employment and utilization of labour, machine and power throughout year.

6.Better control of weeds, pests and diseases

7.One crop provides physical support to the other crop

8. One crop provides shelter to the other crop

9.Erosion control through providing continuous leaf cover over the ground surface, and it is the small farmers of limited means who is most likely to benefit.

There are some disadvantages of intercropping system

a)Yield decrease because of adverse competition effect.

b)Allelopathic effect.

c)Creates obstruction in the free use of machines for intercultural operations. 

d)Large farmers with adequate resources may likely to get less benefit out of intercropping.

Mixed croppingGrowing of two or more crops simultaneously on the same piece of land, without any definite row arrangement. This system of cropping is practiced in areas where climatic hazards such as flood, drought, frost etc are frequent and common. The farmers always fear that their crops will fail. Mixed cropping is also practiced with a view to achieve multiple requirements of food and fibre. Farmers generally sown sarson on the borders of wheat fields to harvest sarson for greens during the initial stages.

Under mixed cropping, the time of sowing of all the crops is almost the same However, they may mature either together (wheat + gram, wheat + barley or wheat + mustard) or they may mature at different times (arhar + Jowar, til + mung or bajra + groundnut.

Based method of sowing mixed cropping can be classified into the following groups1. Mixed crops – In this case, the seeds of different crops are mixed together and then sown either in lines or they are broadcasted. The system is not scientific and it causes problems in performing all the agricultural operations and harvesting of the crops.

2. Companion crops – Under this method the seeds of different crops are not mixed together but different crops are sown in different rows i.e. between two rows of mustard five to eight rows of wheat or between two rows of arhar two three rows of groundnut are sown. This method of sowing facilitates in weeding, intercultural, plant protection operation and even in harvesting.

3. Guard crops – Under this system of cropping, the main crops is grown in the centre, surrounding by hardy or thorny crops such as safflower around pea or wheat, mesta (patsan), around sugarcane, jowar around maize etc with a view to provide protection to the main crop.

4. Augmenting crops – When sub crops are sown to supplement the yield of the main crop, the sub crops are called as augmenting crops such as Japanese mustard with berseem. Here the mustard helps in getting higher tonnage of fodder in spite of the fact that berseem gives poor yield in fist cutting.

Principles of mixed cropping

1 All crops do not fail under adverse climate conditions.

2 An epidemic attack of any insect, pest or disease kills only one crop without affecting the rest of the crops.

3 The farmers grow different crops which fulfill their daily need or demand for cereals, pulses and oilseeds.

4.Mixed cropping checks soil erosion, weeds etc.

5.It improves or maintains the soil fertility.

6.Family labour and cattle are employed throughout the whole year.

7.Legume and non-legume mixture increase the fodder quantity and quality both.

8.It reduces cost of cultivation.

Advantages:1. It offers highest return on farm business, as the by products of farm are properly utilized.

2. It provides work throughout year.

3. Efficient utilization of land, labour, equipment and other resources.

4. The crop by products such as straw, bushes, fodder etc. is used for feeding of livestock and in return they provide milk.

5. Manures available from livestock maintain soil fertility.

6. It helps in supplying all the food needs of the family members.

7.Intensive cultivation is possible.

8. If one source of income is lost he can maintain his family from other source of income.

9.Milk cattle’s provide draft animals for crop production and rural transport.

10. Mixed farming increases social status of the farmer.

In India the livestock is much closed connected with agriculture because animal power is the main source of power in agriculture. FYM is the main source for maintaining soil fertility and animals make good use of subsidiary and by-products on farms and in turn they provide milk under such circumstances mixed farming will most suit in Indian conditions.

Disadvantages:1. Indigenous method of cultivation is used till now.2. Draft and milch animals should be sold when they fail in production.3. Healthy calf should be reared to replace age old animals.

Difference between - Inter Cropping & Mixed Cropping          

1. The main object is to utilize the space left between two rows of main crop.2. More emphasis is given to the main crop3. There is no competition between both crops.4. Inter crops are of short duration & are harvested much earlier than main.5. Sowing time may be same or different.6. Crops are sown in different rows without affecting the population of main crop when sown as sole crop.

In Inter Cropping

1.To get at least one crop under favorable conditions.2. All crops are cared equally.3. There is competition between all crops growing.4. The crops are almost of the same duration.5. It is same for all crops.6. Either sown in rows or mixed without considering the population of either.

Under Mixed Cropping

Mechanism of yield advantage……

The most important index of biological advantage is the relative yield total (RYT) introduced by De wit or Land van Den Bergh (1965) or land equivalent ratio by Willey (1979).

1.The mixture yield of a component crop expressed as a portion of its yields as a sole crop from the same replacement series is the relative yields of the crop and sum of relative yields of component crop is called Relative yield total ( RYT).2. The total land area required under sole cropping to give the same yields obtained in the intercropping is called Land equivalent ratio (LER). Both the expressions (RYT and LER) are similar.

Land Equivalent Ratio (LER):This is the most frequently used efficient indicator. LER can be defined as the relative land area under sole crop that would be required to produce the equivalent yield under a mixed or an intercropping system at the same level of management.LER can be mathematically represented as follows

Where Yi is the yield of ith component from a unit area grown as intercrop and Yij is the yield of ith component grown as sole crop over the same area . In brief , LER is the summation of ratios of yield of intercrop to the yield of sole crop .

Example:- Let the yields of groundnut and redgram grown as pure crops be 1200

and 1000 kg/ha respectively. Let the yields of these crops when grown as

intercrops be 1000 and 600 kg/ha respectively. The land equivalent ratio of

groundnut +redgram intercropping system is as follows :

Yield of inter crop LER of groundnut =

Yield of sole crops

1000

1200

LER of redrgram = 600/1000

LER of system= 1000 600

1200 1000

LER of the indicates that 43 per cent yield advantage is obtained

when grown as intercrops compared to growing as sole crops. In other words the

sole crop have to be grown in 1.43 ha to get the same yield level that is obtained

from 1.00 ha of intercropping.

+ = 1.43

Note:--(The peanut or groundnut (Arachis hypogaea) is a species in the family Fabaceae from Brazil then China Groundnut is called as the ‘King’ of oilseeds .Groundnut is also called as wonder nut and poor men’s cashew nut. Groundnut is one of the most important cash crops of our country. It is a low-priced commodity but a valuable source of all the nutrients. Ground nut ranks first in India among oil seed crops. It covers 45% of area and accounts for 55% of production of the total oil seeds. India is rated as the third largest producer of groundnut in the world with annual production of over 5-6 million tons. Gujarat, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu and Karnataka. and redgram Cajanus cajan Leguminosae it originated in Afric).

References citied - www.iosrjournals.org A Survey on Area, Production and Productivity of Groundnut Crop in India. Journal of Economics and Finance , ESTIMATING GROWTH RATES, DECOMPOSITION ANALYSIS AND INSTABILITY OF GROUNDNUT CROP PRODUCTION IN ANDHRA PRADESH *,1Sita Rambabu, V., 2Farukh, Md. and 3Solmon Raju Paul, K. Agricultural Economics, Agricultural College, Bapatla International Journal of Development Research Vol. 4, Issue, 1, pp. 085-087, January, 2014

LER of more than 1 indicates yield advantage, equal to 1 indicates no grain or no gain or no loss and less than 1 indicates yield loss. It can be used both for replacement and additives series of intercropping.LER is the summation of ratios of yields of intercrop to the yield of sole crop.LER gives a better picture of the competitive abilities of the component crops. It also gives actual yield advantage of intercropping. In other words LER is the measure of production efficiency of different system by convening the production in terms of land acreage. LER gives an accurate assessment of the biological efficiency of intercropping.Reference- Principles of agronomy by Reddy And Reddy.

Relative Yields Total (RYT): The mixture yields of a component crop expressed as a portion of its yields as a sole crop from the same replacement series is the relative yield of crop and sum of the relative yields of component crop is called Relative Yields Total (RYT). Or When LER is compared at uniform overall plant density of sole and intercrops then it is known as RYT. In RYT yields advantages is to measure not only unit area, but also on unit population. This is mainly used for replacement series.

Yab+Yba

Yaa+YbbRYT=

Where Yaa = yields of component a as sole crop Ybb = yields of component b is a sole crop Yab = yields of component a as intercrop in b Yba = Yield of component b as intercrop in a.

Example:-in pasture mixture, Stylo and anjan grown in 1:1 ratio with 50% sole crop population of both crops. In I/C, mixture yield (50%) for Stylo and anjan is 6 and 4 tons/ha of fodder, respectively. The yield of these crops in sole stand with 100% plant population is 10 and 8 ha of green fodder, respectively.

RYT = 12+8/10+8 = 20/18 = 1.11.

So RYT 1.11 indicates 11% extra fodder yields obtained by mixture. Two crops yields in the intercrop mixture are MA and MB and the yield of crops grown as pure crop are SA and SB then the combined index is

L= MA/SA +MB/SB = LA+LB

The intercrop embodied in LER is that L represents the land required for sole crops to reduce yields achieved in the intercropping mixture. A value of L greater than (1) indicates overall biological advantages of intercropping. The two component of total index LA and LB represent the efficiency of yields production of each crop when grow in mixture, relative to crop performance

Relative Crowding Coefficient (K or RCC): It is proposed by de Wit (1960). It is used in replacement series of intercropping. It indicates whether a species or crop when grown in mixed population has produced more or less yield than expected in pure stand. In 50 : 50 mixture Relative crowding coefficient can be defined as

Kab= Mixture yield of a Pure yield of a - mixture yield of a =Yab/Yaa+Yab

 But when population differ from 50: 50 then.

Kab= Yab*Zba

(Yaa-Yab)Zab

Where, K = coefficient of each crop speciesYaa = Yield of pure stand of aYbb = Yield of pure stand of bYab = Mixture yield of a in combination with bYba = Mixture yield of b in combination with aZab = Sown proportion of a in mixture with bZba = Sown proportion of b in mixture with aKab = Values indicate the following conclusions:K>1 = there is yield disadvantageK= 1 = there is no differenceK< 1 = there is yield advantage in mixingCrowding coefficient and LER give the yield advantage but only LER give the magnitude of advantage. Therefore LER is preferred to assess the competition effects and yield advantage in intercropping situations.

The two main indices of dominance are the aggressivity and competition index. Aggressivity is proposed by Mc Gihrist (1965). It gives a simple measure of how much the relative yield increase in species A is greater than that for species B. It is an index of dominance.

Effective Land Equivalent Ratio (ELER): Mead and Willey (1980) showed that any required ratio could be achieved by growing the intercrop of the land area and one of sole crops the remainder.

P = (La+E ) / (LER+E)

LER is a measure of the net advantages from the combined intercrop determined by adding the crop and sole crop relative yields.

ELER= Lb ((1-La)+ LER-1)P)

Staple Land Equivalent Ratio (SLER): In situation, where the primary objective is to produce yields of one component (staple crop) usually a cereal and some yields of the legume, the concept of SLER is composed.

SLER= MDA/SA + P{MB/SB}Where, MDA is derived yield of A in mixture yield and P, the proportion of land devoted for intercropping. The two crop yields in the intercrop mixture are MA and MB and yield of crops grown as sole crop are SA and SB.

Land Equivalent Coefficient (LEC):It was proposed by Adetilaye and Ezedinma (1986) the product of ler of intercrop components.

LEC= MA*MB/ SB*SB

Area Harvest Equivalency Ratio (AHER):This was proposed by Bal Subramanian and Sekayange (1990). It indicates resources efficiency. The concept of AHER combines the area time factors in a practical sense quantifying intercrop yield advantage particularly in multi-season.Crop Performance RatioIt is defined as the productivity of an intercrop per unit area of ground compared was expected from sole crops sown in the same proportions (Azam Ali et al 1990). For each same then productivity in the intercrop can be expressed as a partial CPR.

It can therefore, be regarded as a measure of association or interaction when crop with the strength of relationship for a two crop mixture the minimum expected product by yield advantage is obtained and LEC greater than 0.25 (25%). This was obtained from the 50:50 yields where inter-specificcompetition equaled intra-specific competition.

LEC = la * LB = 0.5 * 0.5 = 0.25.

The LEC is developed to assess the interaction and potential of crop mixture. It is derived from the understanding that in intercrop yields, as compare optimum sole crop yield is due competition assuming that the inter competition is absent.

References:-•Modern concepts and advance principles in crop production by Panda S.C.•Fundamentals of Agriculture by Arun Katayan.•Hand Book of Agriculture by ICAR New Delhi.•Principles of agronomy. By Reddy and Reddy .•Irrigation agronomy by Dr.S.R.Reddy.•www.iosrjournals.org A Survey on Area, Production and Productivity of Groundnut Crop in India. Journal of Economics and Finance , ESTIMATING GROWTH RATES, DECOMPOSITION ANALYSIS AND INSTABILITY OF GROUNDNUT CROP PRODUCTION IN ANDHRA PRADESH *,1Sita Rambabu, V., 2Farukh, Md. and 3Solmon Raju Paul, K. Agricultural Economics, Agricultural College, Bapatla International Journal of Development Research Vol. 4, Issue, 1, pp. 085-087, January, 2014•Maximizing crop yields by N.K.Fageria.•Weed Management by U.S.Walia.•A text book of agronomy by B.Chandrasekaran et al.•http://www.agriinfo.in/?page=topic&superid=1&topicid=492

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