NEWS
Lablab purpureus: A dry-season
feed in eastern Kenya
Arnold Kerina
Current Address: University of Eldoret, Eldoret, Kenya
E-mail Address: [email protected]
Reprinted From: http://bit.ly/2tJTkLJ
F
odder production in semi-arid east-
ern Kenya is characterized by low
farm inputs and outputs. Drought
and low soil fertility are major limiting
factors in forage production. Farmers
normally use stover from cereals such
as maize and sorghum or from legumes
like lablab, common beans and cow-
peas as fodder during the dry season.
In Kenya, Lablab purpureus or ‘Dolichos
bean’ is popularly called ‘Njahi’. It is a
dual-purpose legume primarily grown
for grain in eastern Kenya. It is good
fodder for livestock.
Particularly under semi-arid conditions,
lablab herbage dry matter (DM) yield
is usually higher than that of beans and
cowpeas. It can yield up to 6 t/ha of
herbage DM. Thus, lablab is drought-
tolerant and can grow under relatively
low soil fertility conditions.
It is grown as a companion crop to
maize or as a cover crop. It will also im-
prove soil fertility by fixing atmospheric
nitrogen to the soil.
Figure 1: Lablab on a farm in eastern
Kenya. Photo: A Kerina
29
Forage use
In eastern Kenya, lablab is mainly used
during the dry season when animal
feeds are in short supply. The whole
plant is utilized in different ways. It can
be grazed directly as a pasture, cut and
directly fed green to livestock, stored as
hay or used to make silage. As it stays
green during the dry season after grain
harvest, the plant is highly palatable to
livestock. Lablab hay is employed to
supplement maize or sorghum stover,
which are of poor nutritional qual-
ity. Lablab stems are more fibrous than
those of other legumes, e.g. beans and
cowpeas. As a result, livestock tend to
eat leaves, which are soft and tender,
but leave back the stems. Lablab fodder
has high crude protein content. It’s also
rich in calcium, phosphorous and vita-
mins A and D. The Kenyan KALRO has
released a few cultivars; but only KAT/
DL-1 was found on a significant scale
in the region due to both high grain
and herbage yields. Biomass yields of
KAT/DL-1 under rain-fed conditions
were up to 3 t/ha in on-farm trials in
Makueni County in 2014. Grotelüschen
(2014) tested and identified other dual-
purpose accessions with potential for
the region: Q6880B, CPI 81364 and CPI
52513 from the Australian tropical for-
age germplasm collection.
Developing multi-purpose Lablab in
Tanzania
Over the past four years, staff from the
Canadian Foodgrains Bank and the Nel-
son Mandela African Institution of Sci-
ence and Technology, in Arusha, have
been experimenting with inter-cropping
and sole-cropping of both local Tanza-
nian and introduced lablab accessions
with maize.
From their work they anticipate several
multi-purpose varieties will be released
as cultivars in Tanzania by early 2020.
Contact
Neil Miller, Arusha, Tanzania at E-mail:
[email protected].
Figure 2: Experimenting to intercrop maize with lablab: Conservation
Agricultural Officer Neil Miller at a trial site near Moshi, northern Tanzania.
Photo: BL Maass
Grassroots
Vol 19
No 1
March 2019