Journal of Applied Biosciences (J. Appl. Biosci.) [ISSN 1997 - 5902]
Volume 22: 1326 - 1332. Published October 7, 2009.
Effect of polythene and cover crop Mucuna pruriens (L.) DC. in the control of weeds in pineapple (Ananas comosus (L.) Merr.) in Côte d’Ivoire
^*MANGARA Ali, **N’DA ADOPO Achille Aimé, ***KOUAME N’Dri Marie-Thérèse and ****KEHE Martin
*Université d’Abidjan-Cocody, UFR Biosciences Laboratoire de Botanique, 09 BP 389 Abidjan 09 / Côte d’Ivoire ; **Centre National de Recherche Agronomique ; 01 BP 1740 Abidjan 01 / Côte d’Ivoire ; ***Université d’Abidjan-Cocody, UFR Biosciences Laboratoire de Botanique ; ****Centre National de Recherche Agronomique, 01 BP 1740 Abidjan 01 / Côte d’Ivoire
*Corresponding author e-mail: mangarali@yahoo.frABSTRACT
Objectives: Difficulty to prevent weed growth in pineapple crop is one of the major problems facing farmers in Côte d’Ivoire. This study analyzed the effect of polythene and cover crop Mucuna pruriens on the weeds.
Methodology and results: The polythene and M. pruriens treatments were applied separately or in combination in a randomized Fisher block and their ability to suppress weed growth assessed every 15 days. From 30 to 45 days after M. pruriens sowing, control plots set up without polythene and cover crop, showed rates of coverage by weeds between 40 to 60 % whereas plots with either M. pruriens or polythene alone had weed coverage from 25 to 37 % and 21 to 33 %, respectively. Plots with combination of M. pruriens plus polythene maintained low weediness of around 13%. After 75 days, control plots were almost totally covered by weeds. Polythene leads to an immediate absence of light to the weeds and the consequence is failure of their seeds to germinate or growth interruption of those that may have already germinated. On the contrary, plots with the cover cropshowed gradual coverageby weed florapartly due both to the late germination of its seed and progressive growth and also due to the relatively low sowing density. The weed suppression effect of M. pruriens lasts approximately three months.
Conclusion and application of findings: In this study, polythene, which is commonly used in pineapple crop, proved its efficiency against weeds, though its tendency to shred and fragmentation leads to pollution of orchards. Rational application of these two options allows reduction time spent on weeding which reduces the production cost.
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