A Caution About One Use of The Bird Resistant Grain Sorghum
Nematodes in Agroforestry
Control of Leaf-Cutter Ants
Use of Legume Cover Crops in Orchards or Plantations
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Quinoa, Chenopodium Quinoa, The Incan "Mother Grain."
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Quinoa, Chenopodium Quinoa, The Incan "Mother Grain."
Information regarding Quinoa.
Use of Legume Cover Crops in Orchards or Plantations
The use of cover crops in orchards and plantations.
Since the early 1900s legumes have been used as cover crops in oil palm plantations in Asia. More recently it is being evaluated for other trees: soursop (Annona muricata) in Costa Rica, citrus in Honduras and Surinam, bananas in Panama, etc. Primary benefits are controlling weeds, reducing production costs and use of chemicals, and increasing yields.
Control of Leaf-Cutter Ants
ECHO was contacted with a vivid description of problems of leaf-cutter ants in Guyana. The farmers even tried building water filled moats around plants but the ants built leaf bridges and crossed right over.
Jack bean and Sesame may help control leaf-cutter ants.
Nematodes in Agroforestry
Information about nematodes affecting agroforestry trees.
Nematodes are tiny “wire worms” that abound in the soil. The root-knot nematode, Meloidogyne incognita, is one of the most infamous, both for its devastating effect on crops and the ease with which its presence can be identified.
The increasing use of agroforestry systems in which trees and shrubs are permanently grown in close association with annual crops raises an interesting question. How do these associations affect nematode damage, especially if the trees are themselves hosts for nematode survival and population build-up?
A Caution About One Use of The Bird Resistant Grain Sorghum
In some parts of the world people roast sorghum, as is done with corn (roasting ears) in the United States.
Roasting bird resistant sorghum at the dough stage may not sufficiently remove the cyanogenic glycoside dhurrin.