YIELD COMPARISON OF FORAGE LEGUMES UNDER PARTIAL STRESS AND NORMAL IRRIGATION

Legumes yield was compared for green forage production under partial stress and regular water supplies at Agronomy Research Farm, KP, Agricultural University Peshawar. Sowing was done in winter 2005in Randomized Complete Block Design, initially at uniform soil moisture contents. Fifteen legumes were planted in three replications in two experiments on a common field. One half was irrigated once after each cut (Exp. 1) and the other half as per crop water demand (Exp. 2). Sowing was done in rows 45 cm apart. Data were recorded for three seasonal cuts; i.e. 107, 150 and 197 days after sowing. Results showed that both fresh and dry matter yield were significantly different (P 0.05) in species and for cuts. Highest dry matter was observed for barseem (Super Late Sargodha) yielded 8120 kg ha^-1, followed by S1 (7510 kg ha^-1) in stress (Exp. 1) and barseem S-03-01 (1082.7 kg ha^- 1), followed by Faisalabad late II (1080 kg ha-1) in normal irrigation (Exp. 2). This shows that same variety of a common species performs differently with different irrigations. Dry matter of the species was almost similarly responded as the fresh matters but with little variation due to differences in plant water content. Swards height did influence by the species and cuts. Leaf to stem ratio is important parameter and proved that tallest plants not necessarily produced the maximum dry matter rather adversely affect leaf to stem ratio which contributing higher in fiber and decrease intake as well as less digestible. We conclude that more water is essential for high matter production of almost all forges legumes and barseem is unmatchable species during 1st years seasonal forage production. However, Super Late Sargodha (SLS), Agaiti Berseem (AB), Local Shaftal (LS), Sargodha Lucerne (SL), Lucerne S 2000 (LS 2000), Kohat Vetch (KV) and Province D.R. 2001 (PDR) were observed relative better under partial drought than regular irrigation.