Effects of Pigeon Pea (<i>Cajanus cajan</i>) Intercropping on Sorghum Crop Production and Soil Fertility Level in Case of Harari Regional State (Erer Research on Station)

Abstract

The study was conducted during 2019 main cropping season at Erer research station Babile district PA. Globally pigeon pea (<i>Cajanus cajan</i> (L.) Millsp.) is the fifth most important pulse crop mainly grown in the developing countries by resource-poor farmers in drought prone areas and on degraded soils. It is a multipurpose leguminous crop that can provide food, forage, fuel wood and fodder for the small-scale farmer in subsistence agriculture. Pigeon pea is a deep-rooted and drought tolerant grain legume that adds substantial amount of organic matter to the soil and has the ability to fix up to 235 kg N/ha). Harari regional state, farmers didn’t accept drought tolerant sorghum variety, because of small harvests of total biomass. Thus why, pigeon pea sorghum intercropping can solve the problem of low availability of forage and low soil fertility in this low land area. The treatments of the experiments were, Sole sorghum (malkam) variety, Sorghum + Accession 16520, Sorghum + Accession 16527, sorghum +Accession 16528, pigeon pea Accession 16520, Pigeon pea Accession 16527 and Accession 16528 respectively. The design of the experiment was, RCBD with three replication. The result showed significant difference statistically, in terms of plant height, panicle length, and panicle diameter at 5% (table 1). The highest plant height was obtained from the treatment with sorghum intercropped with pigeon pea accession 16527 (tsegas variety). The result that obtained was statistically not significant in terms of grain yield (p < 0.01) among treatments (both sole and intercropped one). In (Table 1) was indicated that intercropping of pigeon pea Accessions had no negative significant effect on grain yields of sorghum. The maximum grain yields were obtained from T3 (sorghumX16527 pigeon pea accession); (2894) kg ha^-1), followed by T2 (16527 pigeon pea accession) (2856) kg ha^-1 respectively. The minimum grain yield obtained from sole sorghum (2339 kg ha^-1). The most probable reason for this variation could be due to leguminous nature of pigeon pea accessions that add nitrogen nutrients to the soil and affect sorghum positively. When observed graphically, there is mean yield difference. Both land equivalent ratio and relative total yield was calculated and the obtained result is about 1.22. So this intercropped experiment is advantageous. Partial budget analysis was conducted and the experiment is economically viable.