Effect of management practices under cowpea-maize cropping systems in South Africa: maize yield case study

Document Abstract / Summary Overview

Abstract Maize is the most important cereal crop in sub-Saharan Africa, high yielding and easy to process crop. A factorial experiment randomized in complete block design with three replications was conducted during 2011/12 and 2012/13 planting seasons. The experiment comprised of three cropping systems (cowpea-maize rotation, monocropping maize and intercropped maize), three sites (Potchefstroom, Taung and Rustenburg) and two rates of nitrogen fertilizers applied in kg ha-1 at each site (0 and 95 at Potchefstroom, 0 and 92 at Rustenburg, 0 and 113.5 at Taung). The experiment was conducted to investigate the effect of cropping system, site, and nitrogen fertilization on maize yield. The measured yield parameters were maize ear length, ear mass, kernel number per ear, hundred seed mass and grain yield. Cowpea-maize in rotation had significantly higher ear mass, kernel number per ear and grain yield than maize planted on intercropping system. The application of nitrogen fertilizer under rotational cropping system contributes to higher yield of maize. In this study, maize ear mass and grain yield were significantly affected by the interaction effect of cropping system x site x nitrogen fertilization.