Plant Sciences

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Research from the Department of Plant Sciences. The department website may be found athttps://www.ag.ndsu.edu/plantsciences

Blizzard Watch is the newsletter for the Department of Plant Sciences and can be found at https://hdl.handle.net/10365/28265

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Browsing Plant Sciences by Subject "alfalfa"

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    Corn-Alfalfa Intercropping with Different Row Spacings
    (North Dakota State University, 2022) Bibby, Samuel
    Alfalfa (Medicago sativa L.) is a staple crop grown mainly by dairy and beef farmers in the Midwest. To determine if seeding alfalfa with corn (Zea mays L.) could increase alfalfa forage yield and nutritive value in the second year, and provide a corn crop during the first year, an experiment was conducted in Prosper and Hickson, ND in 2020 and 2021. Corn grain yield in 2020 was negatively impacted by 152-cm corn row spacing compared with 76-cm row spacing. However, there was no significant difference in corn grain yield with or without an alfalfa intercrop for the same row spacing although it did trend lower in treatments with alfalfa intercropped. Intercropping corn and alfalfa with 76-cm corn row spacing was more profitable than conventional seeding. Optimizing this specific cropping system for growers in the Midwest could increase profitability as well as forage nutritive value and crop efficiency.
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    Productive and Economic Analysis of Silage Maize and Alfalfa Intercropping
    (North Dakota State University, 2021) Lukaschewsky, Johanna Verushka
    Intercropping of maize (Zea mays L.) and alfalfa (Medicago sativa L.) is not a commonpractice because alfalfa generally reduces maize grain and biomass yield. The objective of thisresearch was to evaluate the productivity and profitability of maize-alfalfa intercropping. Theexperiment was conducted in Fargo and Prosper, ND, from 2014 to 2017. The design was arandomized complete block design with four replicates and a split-plot arrangement. Treatmentswere: 1) maize monoculture, 2) maize intercropped with alfalfa, 3) maize intercropped withalfalfa + prohexadione, and 4) spring-seeded alfalfa (in 2015). Alfalfa established inintercropping with maize had almost double the forage yield in the following year compared withspring-seeded alfalfa, and had higher net returns than silage-maize followed by spring-seededalfalfa the following year. This system has the potential to get more growers to have alfalfa inthe rotation by skipping the typical low yielding alfalfa in establishment year.