Effects of Pea (Pisum sativum L.) Cultivars for Mixed Cropping with Oats (Avena sativa L.) on Yield and Competition Indices in an Organic Production System

Abstract

The benefits of cereal-legume mixed cropping is a sustainable agricultural practice. However, knowledge of the genotypic differences of semi-leafless pea varieties is not enough to help them compete with cereals. In this study, the effects of Lithuania’s newest Pisum sativum cultivars (‘Egle DS’ and ‘Lina DS’) and, for comparison, a control cultivar (‘Jūra DS’) established with Avena sativa in mixed cropping system were investigated. Three years of field trials (2018, 2019 and 2020) with four experiments involved three different mixtures of each field pea cultivar with oat. The aboveground biomass of mixed cropped new field pea cultivars was found to be significantly higher: biomass of cultivars ‘Egle DS’ increased by 17.0% and ‘Lina DS’ by 7.2% on average compared with the control cultivar ‘Jūra DS’. For the mixed cropping system, statistically greater total aboveground biomass was observed with plant ratios of 50% pea + 50% oat and 60% pea + 40% oat compared to peas monocultures. Mixed cropped oat was the dominant species in all tested mixture compositions; however, the highest total grain yield of mixed crops was obtained when new pea ‘Lina DS’ and ‘Egle DS’ cultivars were included in the mixtures compared with the control cultivar. The new pea cultivar ‘Egle DS’ had a greater effect on protein content compared to other tested pea cultivars. In the new pea cultivars ‘Lina DS’ and ‘Egle DS’, the higher photosynthetic capacity and aboveground biomass of mixed cropped pea with oat showed mixture effects in the mixed cropped system and could increase total yield compared with pea monoculture. Generally, the new pea cultivars displayed a greater Land Equivalent Ratio (LER) value, resulting in the greatest yield among the mixtures on average for all three years and all four experiments. Future research could optimize the effects of pea cultivar mixtures with cereals to further improve the yield of organic mixed cropping systems.

Garden Peas Production Variation in Relation to Some Biostimulating Substances

“…Legumes have been studied in different soil conditions, crop structure and agricultural technologies, from the perspective of climate changes and future technologies, intelligently adapted to the conditions of the climate perspective (Dutta et al, 2022). In the conditions of increasing requirements for food, of sustainable agricultural systems based on reduced inputs, of conservative agricultural systems, adapted to local resources, as well as of other beneficial aspects (ecological and socioeconomic), legumes present a major interest for agriculture (Stagnari et al, 2017;Šarūnaitė et al, 2022). Legumes are cultivated on variable land areas in relation to the climatic and soil conditions, the agricultural specifics of different countries, the consumption and commercial requirements, etc.…”

“…), and have highlighted the positive effect of peas in the specifics of the subject addressed, and the study conditions (Yang et al, 2018;Powers & Thavarajah, 2019). As a result of its importance, peas have been studied in relation to the structure of crops and agricultural systems (Powers & Thavarajah, 2019;Šarūnaitė et al, 2022), with the soil, the activity of microorganisms, nitrogen fixation (Vocanson et al, 2006;Chaudhari et al, 2022;Woo et al, 2022), but also with other elements of technology and influencing factors. In relation to the type of culture and the destination of production, different pea varieties were studied to evaluate the relationship between environmental and technological factors, production, quality, sensitivity to stress factors, etc.…”