Abstract

The role of leguminous crops in crop rotation is well known. Since they have the capacity to fix the atmospheric nitrogen in the soil, legumes form the chief source of organic nitrogen available at a low cost. The desirable attributes of a good green manure crop are easily decomposable green matter rich in nitrogen and good vegetative growth within a short period of 60 days, so that it can easily fit into the gardenland rotation. At present, sunnhemp is universally grown as a green manure crop in the gardenlands of Coimbatore because of its short duration. Earlier study had focussed attention on Clusterbean as a good green manure crop in place of sunnhemp, because it provides the grower with a rich harvest of readily marketable green pods, before it is incorporated into the soil at 60 days growth (Veeraswami and Kunjamma, 1958). In another field study, Clusterbean C. P. 177 was fixed as the type best suited for the green manure due to its heavy vegetative growth and yield of green matter (Subramaniam and Premsekar, 1960).

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