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Master of Science in Agriculture and Rural Development

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Subject: search.filters.subject.Grain Amaranth

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    Effect of Defoliation and Spacing on the Leaf and Grain Yields of Grain Amaranth
    (KeMU, 2011-05) Gesora, Vincent Morara
    Grain amaranth is an emerging crop which is highly nutritious, drought tolerant vegetable which can be promoted in ASAL areas as it can do well with as little rainfall as 200mm.The crop is being promoted in Turkana County but the effects of different row spacing and defoliation intervals on yields in the region are not known. Because the leaf and seed are both consumed, the study therefore sought to establish the effect of spacing and defoliation on the rate of growth, leaf yield, and grain yields of the crop. Due to its high nutritional value the crop is able to address the malnutritional problems which are rampant in the county. The county relies on animals for protein source which is very expensive hence the need to promote the crop to subsidize the protein source. Different intervals of defoliation of 0, 7, 10 and 14 days, at a fixed 50% defoliation level and row spacing of 60cm, 75cm, and 90cm by drill were used. The treatments were arranged in completely randomized block design (CRBD) to establish their effects on the growth rate, leaf and grain yields. The within line spacing was thinned to 20cm, I4days after sowing. Data collected was subjected to SPSS, ANOVA (to determine if there were any mean differences) and post hoc tests (to determine if the differences were significant). Results indicated that, the closer the spacing (60cm), other factors held constant gave highest leaf and grain yield. The longest defoliation interval of 14 days gave the highest total leaf yield while the no defoliation treatment gave the highest amount of grain. The best combinations from the experiment were 60cm spacing with 14 day defoliation interval for highest leaf yield while 60cm spacing with no defoliation treatment yielded the highest amount of grain.
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    Effects of Phosphate Fertilization on Productivity of Grain Amaranth ( Amaranthus Incas )in Murinduko Location of Kirinyaga County
    (KeMU, 2011-07) Nyariaro, Benson O.
    This study was carried out between November 2010 and March, 2011 to determine the influence of phosphate fertilization on productivity of Grain Amaranth (Amaranthus incas). Kenyan farmers in the dry lands suffer perpetual food insecurity and poor livelihoods despite having large hectares of fallow lands. Grain amaranth is a drought resistant crop of high value which has a potential for improving food and nutritional security and income generation for farmers in arid and semi-arid lands. The specific objectives were to evaluate the yields per plant for the different rates of phosphate fertilization and determine grain crude protein content of amaranth using the different phosphate fertilization regimes. The study used a Randomized Complete Block Design (RCBD) with three replications to compare productivity (production of grains per unit area) of grain amaranth using 0, 5, 7 and 10g fertilizer applications per plant from Manure, DAP and Rock Phosphate per hole. The research findings indicated that productivity was improved most by 5g fertilizer application per plant (595.05g/m2) for DAP followed by (342.6g/m2) Rock-phoshate in total yield per plot compared to control (237.33g/ m2). The total dry grain yield in the 10g of fertilizer per plant (L4) plots were 293.98g/ m2 for DAP and 275.55g/ m2 for Rock-phosphate, Manure (160.8g/ m2) and Control (256.93g/ m2) respectively. The 7g per plant fertilizer plots were moderate in yields and sometimes gave similar yields as 5g per plant fertilizer (L2) plots. The L3 plots had 579.33g/ m2 for DAP, 275.55g/ m2 Rock¬-phosphate, l 90.59g/ m2 for manure and 244.41 g/m2 for control. Crude protein value was highest at 5g Rock-phosphate application followed by 5g and 7g DAP application per plant and these could be confirmed and used for protein consideration when establishing grain Amaranth crop. The research therefore concluded that there were significant differences between grain yields at 95% confidence interval