Publication Date
1989
Description
The upland areas (> 1000 m) of Baluchistan Province in Pakistan (Latitude 28-32° N) experience a continental semiarid Mediterranean climate with some irregular additions of summer monsoonal rainfall. The current farming systems rely on the production of small ruminants from degraded Artemesia and Chrysapogon sp. rangeland and subsistence cropping of wheat/fallow rotations (Icarda, 1988). Sheep and goat numbers in Baluchistan have increased since 1955 from approximately two to thirteen million head in 1986 (Icarda, 1988). This has resulted in severely overgrazed rangelands and periodic acute feed deficits. In response the Arid Zone Research Institute has initiated a program for the introduction and screening of new forage and range species into the local farming systems. The forage crop component of this program which is reported in this paper has the dual objectives of (a) intensifying and diversifying crop production and (b) producing animal feed for periods of critical shortage and thereby reducing the current severe overgrazing on natural rangelands. Annual sown forage legumes principally Vicia and Lathyrus spp. have been the initial candidates for introduction (Kemick, 1978). The acute severity of the winter season in upland Baluchistan requires species either to be very frost tolerant or to be of a sufficiently short maturity period to allow the growth cycle to be completed between February and mid-May when intense heat and drought stresses terminate rainfed crop growth.
Citation
Ali, Asghar; Keatinge, J.D H.; and Roidar Khan, B, "Introduction, Selection and Evaluation of Annual Sown Forage Legumes Under Continental Mediterranean Climate Conditions in Pakistan" (2025). IGC Proceedings (1989-2023). 17.
https://uknowledge.uky.edu/igc/1989/session13b/17
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Introduction, Selection and Evaluation of Annual Sown Forage Legumes Under Continental Mediterranean Climate Conditions in Pakistan
The upland areas (> 1000 m) of Baluchistan Province in Pakistan (Latitude 28-32° N) experience a continental semiarid Mediterranean climate with some irregular additions of summer monsoonal rainfall. The current farming systems rely on the production of small ruminants from degraded Artemesia and Chrysapogon sp. rangeland and subsistence cropping of wheat/fallow rotations (Icarda, 1988). Sheep and goat numbers in Baluchistan have increased since 1955 from approximately two to thirteen million head in 1986 (Icarda, 1988). This has resulted in severely overgrazed rangelands and periodic acute feed deficits. In response the Arid Zone Research Institute has initiated a program for the introduction and screening of new forage and range species into the local farming systems. The forage crop component of this program which is reported in this paper has the dual objectives of (a) intensifying and diversifying crop production and (b) producing animal feed for periods of critical shortage and thereby reducing the current severe overgrazing on natural rangelands. Annual sown forage legumes principally Vicia and Lathyrus spp. have been the initial candidates for introduction (Kemick, 1978). The acute severity of the winter season in upland Baluchistan requires species either to be very frost tolerant or to be of a sufficiently short maturity period to allow the growth cycle to be completed between February and mid-May when intense heat and drought stresses terminate rainfed crop growth.
