Summary
Fourty four species of native wild herbaceous legumes belonging to 12 genera and associated with mature fallow lands of the derived savanna were collected from seven random locations encompassing an estimated area of 10,800 km2 and containing the seven different geomorphological soil formations in Anambra State of Nigeria.
The number of legume species found differed according to the dominant grass in the fallows sampled, more species being associated with Andropogon, Hyperrhenia and Pennisetum than with Imperata and Loudetia. Detailed vegetation analysis of one hectare of fallow land dominated by Loudetia in one of the locations revealed that legumes comprised about 3% of the species encountered.
In greenhouse trials, all the 19 species studied nodulated. The correlation (r=0.646) between fresh weight of nodules and dry weight of tops was significant at 0.01 level. Leaf N in these species ranged from 4.27% to 1.88%.
The study indicated that a large number of naturally occurring herbaceous leguminous species, some of which appear to have promising potentials for increasing the N economy of the ecosystem, exists in the fallow land of the derived savanna.
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Ezedinma, F.O.C., Agbim, N.N. & Onyekwelu, S.S.C. The contribution of symbiotic nitrogen fixation to the nitrogen economy of natural ecosystems. Plant Soil 51, 503–513 (1979). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02277572
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02277572