Study of the diversity of native and/or naturalized legumes in citrus fruit areas

Dayami Fontes Marrero
Universidad de Ciego de Ávila

ABSTRACT
During three consecutive years the prospection of legumes was conducted in citrus fruit plantations of the Citrus Fruit Enterprise “Ciego de Ávila”, in order to study the diversity of endemic and/or naturalized legumes in these areas, under different edaphic conditions, for their later recommendation as ameliorators of the cover in these plantations. The germplasm of endemic and/or naturalized legumes formed by 18 species was collected, identifying 9 as more promising and the others as less promising; the highest diversity was found in the orange crop (Citrus sinensis) and on the typical Ferralitic Red soil with the following standing out as the species with higher frequency and better edaphic adaptability: D. canum, D. scorpiurus, R. minima, C. pubescens, A. vaginalis, T. labialis and M. pudica. To complement this study the agronomic evaluation of the collected germplasm was conducted, obtaining that the species T. labialis cv. Semilla Oscura behaved as the most suitable to be introduced in citrus fruit farms as cover, because it fulfills all the established selection criteria; in addition, C. pubescens, M. atropurpureum and C. caeruleum are considered as species that can be used in these areas if the weeding frequency is reduced during the rainy season. It is concluded that there is diversity of naturalized legumes in the sampled citrus fruit areas, with potential for their use as cover in such agroecosystem.