Abstract
Besides the lack of soil fertilization, the primary biotic stressor limiting the production of cocoa (Theobroma cacao L.) in Indonesia is pest and disease attacks (PDAs). As a part of the efforts to find out the appropriate solution for the farming constraints, a field trial was carried out for 14 months (2015 – 2016) in Genggelang - North Lombok Regency, Indonesia. The main objective of the experiment was to identify the effects of the use of locally-available materials, i.e., liquid-silicate rock fertilizer (LSRF), botanical pesticide (BP) of neem, and black ants (BA) of Doliccoderus thoracic, on PDAs, bean production, and polyphenol and lignin contents of cocoa pod shell. A randomized complete block design was laid out in three blocks, and the treatments were LSRF, LSRF+BP, LSRF+BA, BA, and control. Results reveal that the application of those materials reduced the intensity of pest and disease attacks (e.i., respectively, 6 - 24 % and 3 - 9 % lower than for that of the control), increased 18 – 119 % of bean production, and improved the polyphenol and lignin contents of pod shell. The highest increase (119 %) of bean production was due to the foliar application of LSRF. The positive effect of the treatments, especially the use of LSRF, associated with the improvement of the resistance of cocoa to PDAs and appropriate supply of plant-essential nutrients. Therefore, the foliar application of LSRF may be promoted as a proper method to improve the production of cocoa, especially of that grown on less fertile soils.
Highlights
The word A. hypogaea has been derived from two Greek words Arachis meaning a legume and hypogaea meaning below ground
The pooled over year mean of varieties indicated, Tole- 1 variety ( Check) is high yielding with mean grain yield of 4174.7kg followed by variety Sedi (3552.5kg/ha) and Babile local (3550.4kg/ha).Variety Sedi has special merit in terms of earliness and recommended for moisture stress areas of Abaya and location with similar agro ecologies while Tole -1 (Standard check) is high yielding varieties and should be used in production until new varieties will be developed through selection/breeding program
Chavadhari, et al [8] and Izge, et al [9] reported highly significant variation for plant height, pods per plant, seeds per plant, hundred seed weight and grain yield in Ground nut which is in line with this finding
Summary
The word A. hypogaea has been derived from two Greek words Arachis meaning a legume and hypogaea meaning below ground (referring to the formation of pods in the soil) It is an annual legume which is known as peanuts, earthnut, monkey-nut and goobers. It is the 13th most important food crop and 4th most important oil seed crop of the world. Groundnut or peanut is an important oil seed crop, grown throughout the tropics between 40° South and 40° North of the equator where the annual rainfall ranges between 500 to 1200 mm and with average daily temperature higher than 20°C. The major groundnut producer region in Ethiopia is Oromia region (41,089 ha), followed by Benshangul- Gumuz (14,759 ha) and Amhara (3,161 ha) regional states [5]. This study was undertaken with the objective of selecting early mature and high yielder Ground nut Variety for the study area
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