INTERCROPPING MAIZE WITH CHICKPEA, GRASS PEA, MUNGBEAN AND GROUNDNUT

Abstract

Al) experiment was conducted at the research field of Sher-e-Bangla Agricultural University, Dhaka during the period from December. 2010 to May, 2011 to study the influence of intercropping system in maize with chickpea, Grass pea, Mungbean, and Groundnut. The trial was layed out in a Randomized Complete Block Design (RCBD) with 3 replications. The experiment comprised of nine treatments viz, T1 = Sole maize. T2 = Sole chickpea, T= Sole Grass pea. '1 4 = Sole Mungbean. T 3= Sole Groundnut, T ( ,= Maize Paired row + 2 rows of chickpea, T 7 Maize Paired row + 2 rows of Grass pea, ir Maize Paired row + 2 rows of Mungbean. T 9 = Maize Paired row + 2 rows ofGroundnut. The collected data were statistically analyzed and the means were adjudged by LSD at 5% level of significance. In case of maize the tallest plant, highest number of cob/plant. cob length, cob diameter and yield was recorded in treatment T 1 (sole maize) where as the highest thousand grain weight was obtained from & T 8 i.e. maize intercrop with Grass pea and Mungbean respectively. In intercropped plants though the highest yield and best yield contributing characters except 1000 seed weight were from sole crop shall the intercrop performed better in terms of economic contributing characters. Maize Mungbean showed better relative yield of maize than other intercropping systems. All the intercropping systems showed higher net return than sole maize or sole other intercrop. The highest net return (Tk 84200 ha') was recorded from T 6 though higher cost was involved and was followed by T (Tk 79500 lia5. The highest BCR (2.95) was obtained from T 6 Paired row + 2 rows of followed by T 7 (2.94) and T 8 (2.93).So in this study intercropping paired rows of maize + two rows of chickpea would agronomically feasible and economically profitable (i.e., maize equivalent yield. LER, relative yield, gross return, net return. BCR etc)