A Comprehensive Approach to Evaluate Durum Wheat–Faba Bean Mixed Crop Performance

Abstract

Plant breeding for intercropping is lagging because most varieties currently available in the market are selected for sole cropping systems. The present study analyzed the response of durum wheat (12 varieties) and faba bean (3 varieties) in pure and mixed cropping. Field trials were conducted in 2019 and 2020. The performance of each variety in mixed and pure cropping was evaluated using both univariate and multivariate analyses of the grain yield and land equivalent ratio (LER). For durum wheat, grain protein content was also evaluated. Durum wheat varieties were characterized by good performance in both years, whereas faba bean varieties were more affected by the growing season, suggesting that much breeding effort is warranted to improve the latter as a pure and mixed crop. Moreover, the relative performance of all varieties was affected by their combination in mixed cropping, as evaluated based on the ratio (LERratio) between LER for wheat (LERw) and LER for faba bean (LERfb). To further evaluate the overall performance of wheat and faba bean in mixed cropping, total yield, LERtotal (LERw + LERfb), and ln(LERratio) were subjected to principal component and cluster analyses. The first principal component combined the total yield and LERtotal in a single index of the overall performance of each mixed crop combination. The second principal component, based on ln(LERratio), highlighted the relative performance of varieties in each mixed crop combination. The proposed multivariate approach can be applied in the breeding programs for intercropping to identify variety combinations based on crop performance and the relative importance of the proportion of cereal and legume grains in the total harvest.

Arbuscular Mycorrhizal Fungi and Higher Plants

“…On the research front, the performance of intercropping could be improved by the selection or breeding of crop varieties that are well suited to intercropping (Moore et al 2022(Moore et al , 2023. This is highlighted by the findings of Tavoletti and Merletti (2022) and Pankou et al (2022) on the performance of various varieties of durum wheat and faba bean or wheat and pea in intercropping. Consistently, Moutier et al (2022) found that both wheat and pea or faba bean variety had a significant impact on performance in an intercrop.…”

Improvement of cool-season food legumes for adaptation to intercropping systems: breeding faba bean for intercropping with durum wheat as a case study

“…The proper choice of the variety to be grown in intercropping is crucial because it deeply influences the performance of the whole combination ( Hauggaard-Nielsen and Jensen, 2001 ; Demie et al., 2022 ; Tavoletti and Merletti, 2022 ), and even though it has been reported that the performance of a plant grown as a sole crop is poorly correlated to its performance when grown in a mixture ( Annicchiarico et al., 2019 ) and despite the availability of genetic variability for intercropping ( Mouradi et al., 2018 ; El-Mehy et al., 2020 ; Tavoletti and Merletti, 2022 ), few studies aimed to select and develop CSFL varieties suitable for intercropping or to at least identify the traits associated with intercropping suitability.…”

Effects of spring wheat / faba bean mixtures on early crop development

“…Given this present lack of genotypes suitable for mixing, the experiment of SW-FB crop mixture must rely on the SW cultivars available in the market which are selected for monocultures. Yet, it has been reported that the performance in sole crop could not be considered as an index of wheat performance in mixed cropping (Kammoun et al, 2021;Tavoletti & Merletti, 2022). The nal performance of intercropping depends on the combination of competition, complementarity, cooperation, and compensation between the species which has been named as "The 4C approach" (Demie et al, 2022;Justes et al, 2021).…”