Die Bodenkultur - Journal for Land Management, Food and Environment

E. Kübler, W. Aufhammer und H.-P. Piepho:

Mixing effects in cereal-grain legume stands in dependence of the mixing ratio

Summary

The problem was: how important are the proportions of a cereal component and a grain legume component in a mixed stand for the grain yields under low input conditions. To investigate this problem, a two years field experiment was conducted. Yields of stands, mixed in different ratios and established on terms of substitution or addition were compared to the expected values, based on pure stands, or to the better yielding components in pure stands. Especially in stands of substitution by lens, the results revealed positive mixing effects. In principle these effects were not dependent on the mixture ratio. In all cases in which the seeding rate of legumes exceeded 50%, the grain yield level of the mixtures decreased. Stands established on terms of addition were not able to reach the high expected values. Nevertheless there were combinations, which caused positive mixing effects in comparison to the better yielding components. But the results did not allowe to derive a correlation to the size of the added legume proportion. Definitely the results demonstrated that pure stands were not able to exploit the yielding potential of the given growing conditions. Key words: Mixed stands, mixing effects, cereal components, grain legume components, grain yield.