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THE EFFECTS OF PERIOD OF WEED INTERFERENCE AND WEED CONTROL ON COWPEA (Vigna unquiculata (L.) walp)
Abstract:
Two field experiments were conducted during the 1987 wet season at Samaru in the Northern Guinea savanna ecological :Zone of Nigeria to study the effects of period of weed interference and weed control on cowpea (Vigna unguiculata (L,) Walp). In the study, weed interference for 3 WAS did not adversely affect crop growth, yield and yield attributes. Cowpea was critically adversely affected by weeds between 3 and 9 WAS Once kept weed-free for 9 WAS no significant reduction in seed yield occured compared with the crop kept weed-free throughout, although maximum yield occured with the crops kept weed-free for 15 weeks. In the weed control experiment, all the herbicide treatments significantly reduced weed infestation until 9 WAS Among the weed control treatments, metolachlor plus metobromuron at 1.5+1.5 kg a.i/ha followed by supplementary hoe-weeding at 6 WAS gave effective weed control and resulted in vigorous cowpea growth and significantly higher cowpea yield than the hoe-weeded controls Pre-emergence mixtures of diuron with metolachlor and alachlor each at 0.8+1.5 kg a.i/ha, each followed by post-emergence imazaquin at 0.2 kg a.i/ha at 3 WAS, resulted in comparable cowpea seed yield to the highest obtained with metolachlor plus metobromuron followed by supplementary hoe-weeding . Plots hoe-weeded twice and those treated with alachlor plus diuron at 1.5+0.8 kg a.i/ha followed by supplementary hoe-weeding at 6 WAS had higher seed yield than the untreated control. With the exception of metolachlor plus diuron, all the other plots treated with half the rate of the pre-emergence herbicide mixtures only produced cowpea seed yield that were comparable to those 1 of the untreated control. The pre-emergence herbicide treatments differentially depressed various aspects of cowpea growth like vigour, plant height, leaf dry weight and leaf area. Uncontrolled weed growth throughout the crop life-cycle resulted in significant depression of cowpea growth parameters such as crop vigour, plant height, leaf production and caused cowpea seed yield reduction by 74.2% in the weed interference and 74,5% in the weed control trials.
THE EFFECTS OF PERIOD OF WEED INTERFERENCE AND WEED CONTROL ON COWPEA (Vigna unquiculata (L.) walp)
