Performance of African kale (Brassica carinata) to intercropping with other Indigenous Vegetables

Abstract

The use of African indigenous vegetables (AIVs) among the many communities has gained widespread popularity. These vegetables have a wide range of usage that include provision of food, medicine, income and employment. Despite this, their potential in food security and poverty alleviation has not been exploited. Production is constrained by lack of good seed quality, poor farming systems and practices. Traditionally these crops have been found in the wild or grown as intercrops with other indigenous vegetables or with staples especially cereals and rarely occupy a significant portion of land. However there’s hardly any study reported on intercropping African kale with other AIVs to ensure full exploitation of the vegetables. Intercropping as a farming system increases agricultural biodiversity controls weeds, pests, and diseases and increases productivity. The lack of information however, has equally made it rather difficult to determine the most suitable intercrop. The main objective of this study was to evaluate the suitability of intercropping African kale with slenderleaf, cowpea, African nightshades, and spiderplant. The study was conducted at Maseno University horticultural research farms during the long rains of 2005 (March- August 2005). Seeds were sown directly into the fields after ascertaining viability. The experiment was laid out in a randomized complete block design (RCBD) with five treatments replicated three times. The treatments were T1= African Kale, T2= African kale/slenderleaf, T3= African kale/Cowpea, T4= African kale/Spiderplant, and T5=African kale/African nightshades. Growth and biochemical measurements were taken regularly and this included plant height, leaf number; stem diameter, branch number, canopy spread, leaf area, leaf yield/edible portion, horizontal and vertical root lengths, and chlorophyll determination. Intercropping African kale with the other four indigenous vegetables had no significant effect on plant height, leaf number, branch number, stem diameter, land equivalent ratio (LER) and vertical root length. However intercropping had a significant effect on chlorophyll content, leaf area, leaf yield, canopy spread and horizontal root length. African kale intercropped with cowpea, and African kale intercropped with African nightshade showed a better performance compared to the other intercrops. This could be due to less weed infestation, better moisture conservation and stiff competition.